t\\e ThoZi^ht of Goc 




Book. H^aT :;.: 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



THE 

THOUGHT OF GOD 

IN 

HYMNS AND POEMS 
Cfjree ^erieg in ©ne 

FREDERICK L. HOSMER 
AND 

WILLIAM C. GANNETT 

iFirst .Series 



BOSTON 

THE BEACON PRESS 

1918 



Nfv'N^^S^ 



^ ^ 

K^ 



Copyright, 1885, i8g4, iQfS 

BY FREDERICK L. HOSMER AND 
WILLIAM C. GANNETT 



Stanbope press 

F. H. GILSON COMPANY 
BOSTON, U. S. A. 



NOV i3i9i8 

©C!.A50(>548 



TO 

S. C. H. 



TO 

K. G. W. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

The Thought of God F. L. H. . . 9 

Listening for God W. C. G. . . 11 

The Mystery of God P, L. H. . . 13 

Consider the Lilies, How they Grow W. C. G. • . 15 

The Secret Place of the Most High " . . 17 

The Indwelling God F. L. H. . . 19 

The Highway W. C. G. . . 21 

A Psalm of Trust F. L. H. . . 23 

Glories that Remain W. C. G. . . 25 

The Larger Faith F. L. H. . . 27 

The Stream of Faith W. C. G. . . 29 

Found F. L. H. . . 31 

Theodore W. C. G. . . 33 

My Dead F. L. H. . . 35 

Green Pastures and Still Waters . W. C. G. . . 37 

Father, to Thee F. L. H. . . 39 

Through Unknown Paths .... " . . 41 

He that Inhabiteth Eternity . . . " . . 43 

On the Mount ** . . 45 



VI CONTENTS 

PAOE 

Loyalty F. L. H. , . 47 

Passing Understanding ... " . . 49 

The Sunny Side W. C. G. . . 51 

Flower Sunday F. L. H. . . 53 

The Little Ones " . . 54 

Christmas W. C. G. . . 55 

The Children's Service , . . . F. L, H. . . 57 

Jesus fFAo? W. C. G. . . 60 

Christmas . , . F. L. H. . . 63 

Jesus " . . 65 

The Year of the Lord . . . . W. C. G. . . 67 

The New Year F L. H. . . 69 

The Day ... " . . 72 

The Hills of the Lord . . . , W. C. G. . . 74 

Sunday on the Hill-top .... "... 77 

The Cathedral ....... " . . 80 

The Past " . . 84 

Summer Chemistry " . . 87 

Where Did it Go ? " . . 89 

Recognition ** . . 91 

In a Look " . , 95 

The Fiftieth Anniversary ... •' . . 97 

The Teacher " . . 99 

The Cliff at Newport . . . . F. L. H. . . 100 

In Sleep " . . 101 

Ministry " . . 103 

The Minister's Journey . . . W. C. Q. . . 104 

In Twos •« , . 107 



CONTENTS vii 

FAQE 

Poem and Dogma W. C. G. . . 110 

The Halo « . . 113 

Not All There " . . 115 

Let it Begin Here ! «* . . 117 

Aunt Phillis's Guest " . . 119 

The Negro Burying-ground . , " . . 123 

Gettysburg in 1885 «« . . 126 

The Right Goes Marching On . ♦* . . 129 

Our Country F. L. H. . . 131 



THE THOUGHT OF GOD 

One thought I have, my ample creed, 

So deep it is and broad, 
And equal to my every need, — 

It is the thought of God. 

Each morn unfolds some fresh surprise, 

I feast at Life's full board ; 
And rising in my inner skies 

Shines forth the thought of God. 

At night my gladness is my prayer; 

I drop my daily load. 
And every care is pillowed there 

Upon the thought of God. 

I ask not far before to see. 

But take in trust my road ; 
Life, death, and immortality 

Are in my thought of God. 



10 THE THOUGHT OF GOD 

To this their secret strength they owed 
The martyr's path who trod ; 

The fountains of their patience flowed 
From out their thought of God. 

Be still the light upon my way, 

My pilgrim staff and rod, 
My rest by night, my strength by day, 

blessed thought of God 1 

1880 



LISTENING FOR GOD 

I HEAR it often in the dark, 

I hear it in the light, — 
Where is the voice that calls to me 

With such a quiet might ? 
It seems but echo to my thought, 

And yet beyond the stars ; 
It seems a heart-beat in a hush, 

And yet the planet jars ! 

Oh, may it be that far within 

My inmost soul there lies 
A spirit-sky, that opens with 

Those voices of surprise ? 
And can it be, by night and day, 

That j&rmament serene 
Is just the heaven, where God himself. 

The Father, dwells unseen ? 



12 LISTENING FOR GOD 

God within, so close to me 

That every thought is plain, 
Be Judge, be Friend, be Father still, 

And in thy heaven reign ! 
Thy heaven is mine, — my very soul! 

Thy words are sweet and strong ; 
They fill my inward silences 

With music and with song. 

They send me challenges to right, 

And loud rebuke my ill ; 
They ring my bells of victory, 

They breathe my ' Peace, be still ! 
They ever seem to say, — ' My child, 

Why seek me so all day ? 
Now journey inward to thyself. 

And listen by the way I ' 

Milwaukee, 1870 



THE MYSTERY OF GOD 

O Thou, in all thy might so far, 

la all thy love so near, 
Beyond the range of sun and star, 

And yet beside us here, — 

What heart can comprehend thy name, 
Or, searching, find thee out, 

Who art within, a quickening Flame, 
A Presence round about ? 

Yet though I know thee but in part, 

I ask not, Lord, for more : 
Enough for me to know thou art, 

To love thee and adore. 

O sweeter now than aught besides. 

The tender mystery 
That like a veil of shadow hides 

The Light I may not see ! 



14 THE MYSTERY OF GOD 

And dearer than all things I know- 
Is childlike faith to me, 

That makes the darkest way I go 
An open path to thee. 
1876 



CONSIDER THE LILIES, HOW THEY 
GROW 

He hides within the lily 

A strong and tender care, 
That wins the earth-born atoms 

To glory of the air ; 
He weaves the shining garments 

Unceasingly and still, 
Along the quiet waters, 

In niches of the hill. 

We linger at the vigil 

With him who bent the knee 
To watch the old-time lilies 

In distant Galilee ; 
And still the worship deepens 

And quickens into new, 
As brightening down the ages 

God's secret thrilleth through. 



16 CONSIDER THE LILIES 

Toiler of the lily, 

Thy touch is in the Man ! 
No leaf that dawns to petal 

But hints the angel-plan. 
The flower-horizons open ! 

The blossom vaster shows ! 
We hear thy wide worlds echo, — 

See how the lily grows ! 

Shy yearnings of the savage, 

Unfolding thought by thought, 
To holy lives are lifted, 

To visions fair are wrought ; 
The races rise and cluster, 

And evils fade and fall, 
Till chaos blooms to beauty, 

Thy purpose crowning all ! 

F. R. A. Festival, 1873 



THE SECRET PLACE OF THE MOST 
HIGH 

The Lord is in his Holy Place 

In all things near and far! 
Shekinah of the snowflake, he, 

And Glory of the star, 
And Secret of the April land 

That stirs the field to flowers, 
Whose little tabernacles rise 

To hold him through the hours. 

He hides himself within the love 

Of those whom we love best ; 
The smiles and tones that make our homes 

Are shrines by him possessed ; 
He tents within the lonely heart 

And shepherds every thought ; 
We find him not by seeking long, — 

We lose him not, unsought. 

2 



18 SECRE T PLACE OP THE MOST HIGH 

Our art may build its Holy Place, 

Our feet on Sinai stand, 
But Holiest of Holies knows 

No tread, no touch of hand ; 
The listening soul makes Sinai still 

Wherever we may be, 
And in the vow, ' Thy will be done ! * 

Lies all Gethsemane. 

For C. W. W., Chicago, 1873 



THE INDWELLING GOD 

* that I knew where I might find him !' 

Go not, my soul, in search of him, 
Thou wilt not find him there, — 

Or in the depths of shadow dim, 
Or heights of upper air. 

For not in far-off realms of space 
The Spirit hath its throne ; 

In every heart it findeth place 
And waiteth to be known. 

Thought answereth alone to thought, 
And Soul with soul hath kin ; 

The outward God he findeth not 
Who finds not God within. 

And if the vision come to thee 

Kevealed by inward sign, 
Earth will be full of Deity 

And with his glory shine! 



20 THE INDWELLING GOD 

Thou Shalt not want for company 
Nor pitch thy tent alone ; 

The indwelling God will go with thee 
And show thee of his own. 

gift of gifts, grace of grace, 
That God should condescend 

To make thy heart his dwelling-place 
And be thy daily Friend I 

Then go not thou in search of him, 

But to thyself repair ; 
Wait thou within the silence dim 

And thou shalt find him there I 

1879 



THE HIGHWAY 

* Whatever road I take joins the highway that leads to 
thee.' 

When the night is still and far, 

Watcher from the shadowed deeps ! 
When the morning breaks its bar, 

Life that shines and wakes and leaps 1 
When old Bible- verses glow, 

Starring all the deep of thought, 
Till it fills with quiet dawn 

From the peace our years have brought, — 
Sun within both skies, we see 
How all lights lead back to thee 1 

'Cross the field of daily work 

Run the footpaths, leading — where ? 

Run they east or run they west, 
One way all the workers fare. 



22 THE HIGHWAY 

Every awful thing of earth, — 

Sin and pain and battle-noise ; 
Every dear thing, — baby's birth, 
Faces, flowers, or lovers' joys, — 
Is a wicket-gate, where we 
Join the great highway to thee ! 

Restless, restless, speed we on, — 

Whither in the vast unknown ? 
Not to you and not to me 

Are the sealed orders shown : 
But the Hand that built the road, 

And the Light that leads the feet, 
And this inward restlessness. 

Are such invitation sweet, 
That where I no longer see. 
Highway still must lead to thee I 

For J. W. C, Brooklyn, 1876 



A PSALM OF TRUST 

I LITTLE see, I little know, 

Yet can I fear no ill: 
He who hath guided me till now 

Will be my leader still. 

No burden yet was on me laid 

Of trouble or of care, 
But he my trembling step hath stayed, 

And given me strength to bear. 

I came not hither of my will 

Or wisdom of mine own: 
That higher Power upholds me still, 

And still must bear me on. 

I knew not of this wondrous earth. 
Nor dreamed what blessings lay 

Beyond the gates of human birth 
To glad my future way. 



24 A PSALM OF TRUST 

And what beyond this life may be 

As little I divine, — 
What love may wait to welcome me, 

What fellowships be mine. 

I know not what beyond may lie, 

But look, in humble faith, 
Into a larger life to die 

And find new birth in death. 

He will not leave my soul forlorn ; 

I still must find him true, 
Whose mercies have been new each morn 

And every evening new. 

Upon his providence I lean, 

As lean in faith I must: 
The lesson of my life hath been 

A heart of grateful trust. 

And so my onward way I fare 
With happy heart and calm, 

And mingle with my daily care 
The music of my psalm. 

1883 



GLOEIES THAT REMAIN 

'If that which is done away was glorious, much more that 
which rewMiineth is glorious. ' 

Fairer grows the earth each morning 

To the eyes that watch aright ; 
Every dew-drop sparkles warning 

Of a miracle in sight ; 
Of some nnsuspected glory 

"Waiting in the old and plain ; 
Poet's dream nor traveller's story 

Words such wonders as remain. 

Everywhere the gate of Beauty 

Fresh across the pathway swings, 
As we follow truth or duty 

Inward to the heart of things; 
And we enter, foolish mortals, 

Thinking now the heart to find, — 
There to gaze on vaster portals ! 

Still the Glory lies behind ! 



6 GLORIES THAT REMAIN 

Faith I love ! I love you deeper 

As I press your portals through, 
Heeding not the call of keeper, 

Heeding sole the vision new ! 
All our creeds are hinting only 

Of a faith of nobler strain : 
God is living ! are we lonely- 

'Mid his glories that remain ? 

P. R. A. Festival, 1874 



THE LARGER FAITH 

We pray no more, made lowly wise, 

For miracle and sign ; 
Anoint our eyes to see within 

The common the divine. 

* Lo here, lo there,' no more we cry, 

Dividing with our call 
The mantle of thy presence, Lord, 

That seamless covers all. 

We turn from seeking thee afar 

And in unwonted ways, 
To build from out our daily lives 

The temples of thy praise. 

And if thy casual comings. Lord, 
To hearts of old were dear. 

What joy shall dwell within the faith 
That feels thee ever near 1 



28 THE LARGER FAITH 

And nobler yet shall duty grow, 
And more shall worship be, 

When thou art found in all our life, 
And all our life in thee. 

1879 



THE STREAM OF FAITH 

From heart to heart, from creed to creed, 

The hidden river runs ; 
It quickens all the ages down, 

It binds the sires to sons, — 
The stream, of Faith, whose source is G-od, 

Whose sound, the sound of prayer, 
Whose meadows are the holy lives 

Upspringing everywhere. 

How deep it flowed in olden time, 

When men by it were strong 
To dare the untrod wilderness, 

Charmed on by river-song! 
Where'er they passed by hill or shore, 

They gave the song a voice, 
Till all the craggy land had heard 

The Father's Faith rejoice. 



30 THE STREAM OF FAITH 

And still it moves, a broadening flood ; 

And fresher, fuller grows 
A sense as if the sea were near, 

Towards which the river flows ! 
O thou, who art the secret Source 

That rises in each soul. 
Thou art the Ocean too, — thy charm, 

That ever-deepening roll ! 

For J. M., Newburyport, 1875 



FOUND 

They that know thy name will put their trust in thee 

Name, all other names above, 

What art thou not to me, 
Now I have learned to trust thy love 

And cast my care on thee I 

What is our being but a cry, 

A restless longing still, 
Which thou alone canst satisfy, 

Alone thy fulness fill ! 

Thrice blessed be the holy souls 
That lead the way to thee, 

That burn upon the martyr-rolls 
And lists of prophecy. 

And sweet it is to tread the ground 
O'er which their faith hath trod ; 

But sweeter far, when thou art found, 
The soul's own sense of God ! 



2 FOUND 

The thought of thee all sorrow calms ; 
Our anxious burdens fall ; 
His crosses turn to triumph-palms 
Who finds in God his all. 

1878 



THEODOEE 

O Heart of all the shining day, 

The green earth's still Delight, 
Thou Freshness in the morning wind, 

Thou Silence of the night. 
Thou Beauty of our temple-walls, 

Thou Strength within the stone, — 
What is it we can offer thee 

That is not first thine own ? 

Old memories throng : we think of those 

Awhile with us who trod, 
Whose hands yet lift within our lives, — 

We called them ' Gift of God : ' 
And thine these shinings in our thought, 

This eager, love- wrought hope, 
This deathless faith they wait and watch 

On some fair upper slope. 
3 



34 THEODORE 

O, solemn-sweet the sureness grows, 

When such as they have passed ; 
The darkness fills, the silence thrills, 

Their life pervades the Vast ; 
The vanished virtue quickens through 

And touches every star ; 
Their unseen love — we know it thine, 

Thy Living Love they are ! 

Parker Memorial Dedication, 1873 



MY DEAD 

I CANNOT think of them as dead 
Who walk with me no more ; 

Along the path of life I tread 
They have but gone before. 

The Father's house is mansioned fair 

Beyond my vision dim ; 
All souls are his, and here or there 

Are living unto him. 

And still their silent ministry 
Within my heart hath place, 

As when on earth they walked with me 
And met me face to face. 

Their lives are made forever mine; 

What they to me have been 
Hath left henceforth its seal and sign 

Engraven deep within. 



36 MV DEAD 

Mine are they by an ownership 
Nor time nor death can free ; 

For God hath given to Love to keep 
Its own eternally. 



GREEN PASTURES AND STILL 
WATERS 

Clear in memory's silent reaches 

Lie the pastures I have seen, 
Greener than the sun-lit spaces 

Where the May has flung her green: 
Needs no sun and needs no starlight 

To illume these fields of mine, 
For the glory of dead faces 

Is the sun, the stars, that shine. 

More than one I count my pastures 

As my life-path groweth long ; 
By their quiet waters straying 

Oft I lay me, and am strong. 
And I call each by its giver, 

And the dear names bring to them 
Glory as from shining faces 

In some New Jerusalem. 



38 GREEN PASTURES 

Yet, well I can remember, 

Once I called my pastures, Pain, 
And their waters were a torrent 

Sweeping through my life amain ! 
Now I call them Peace and Stillness, 

Brightness of all Happy Thought, 
Where I linger for a blessing 

From my faces that are nought. 

Nought ? I fear not. If the Power 

Maketh thus his pastures green, 
Maketh thus his quiet waters, 

Out of waste his heavens serene, 
I can trust the mighty Shepherd 

Loseth none he ever led ; 
Somewhere yet a greeting waits me 

On the faces of my dead ! 

F. R. A. Festival, 187T 



FATHER, TO THEE 

Father, to thee we look in all our sorrow, 
Thou art the fountain whence our healing 
flows ; 
Dark though the night, joy cometh with the 
morrow ; 
Safely they rest who on thy love repose. 

When fond hopes fail and skies are dark be- 
fore us, 
When the vain cares that vex our life in- 
crease, — 
Comes with its calm the thought that thou 
art o'er us, 
And we grow quiet, folded in thy peace. 

Nought shall affright us on thy goodness 
leaning, 
Low in the heart faith singeth still her 



40 FATHER, TO THEE 

Chastened by pain we learn life's deeper 
meaning, 
And in our weakness thou dost make us 
strong. 

Patient, heart, though heavy be thy sorrows I 

Be not cast down, disquieted in vain ; 
Yet shalt thou praise him when these dark- 
ened furrows. 
Where now he plougheth, wave with golden 
grain. 

1881 



THROUGH UNKNOWN PATHS 

THOU who art of all that is 

Beginning both and end, 
We follow thee through unknown paths, 

Since all to thee must tend: 
Thy judgments are a mighty deep 

Beyond all fathom-line ; 
Our wisdom is the childlike heart, 

Our strength, to trust in thine. 

We bless thee for the skies above, 

And for the earth beneath, 
For hopes that blossom here below 

And wither not with death ; 
But most we bless thee for thyself, 

heavenly Light within, 
Whose dayspring in our hearts dispels 

The darkness of our sin. 



42 THROUGH UNKNOWN PATHS 

Be thou in joy our deeper joy, 

Our comfort when distressed ; 
Be thou by day our strength for toil, 

And thou by night our rest. 
And when these earthly dwellings fail 

And Time's last hour is come, 
Be thou, God, our dwelling-place 

And our eternal home 1 

1877 



HE THAT INHABITETH ETEKNITS 

Who does not feel how weak 

Are all our words to speak 

Of him, the Infinite, — 

Below all depth, ahove all height ! 

Yet hath no other speech 

To me such wondrous reach 

As this the prophet saith : that he 

Inhabiteth Eternity ! 

We dwell in Time : our ear 
Is deafened by things near ; 
Darkly we see, and know 
Only in part, also. 
From troubles that annoy 
Plucking no future joy, 
Sweetening failure's bitterness 
With no deferred but sure success, — 
As if the passing hour were all, 
With it we rise and fall : 
The while that he 
Inhabiteth Eternity! 



44 HE THAT INHABITETH ETERNITY 

Patient and suffering long 

With man's mistakes and wrong ; 

Seeing how all threads come 

In place in Time's vast loom, 

And in the finished web fulfil 

The pattern of his perfect will ; 

To whom as one is seen 

What is, will be, hath been, — 

Tranquil and lifted clear 

Above our fevered atmosphere, 

Forever dweUeth he 

In the sure strength of his Eternity ! 

Father of my life, 

Give me, amid its strife, 

To bear within my breast 

The secret of thy rest, — 

The river of thy peace within, 

Whose banks are always fresh and green ; 

Give me, while here in Time I be. 

Also to dwell with thee in thine Eternity. 

1879 



ON THE MOUNT 

Not alwcays on the mount may we 
Rapt in the heavenly vision be; 
The shores of thought and feeling know 
The Spirit's tidal ebb and flow. 

Lord, it is good abiding here — 
We cry, the heavenly presence near : 
The vision vanishes, our eyes 
Are lifted into vacant skies 1 

Yet hath one such exalted hour 
Upon the soul redeeming power. 
And in its strength through after day8 
We travel our appointed ways ; 

Till all the lowly vale grows bright 
Transfigured in remembered light, 
And in untiring souls we bear 
The freshness of the upper air. 



46 ON THE MOUNT 

The mount for vision, — but below 
The paths of daily duty go, 
And nobler life therein shall own 
The pattemi on the mountain shown. 



LOYALTY 

When courage fails, and faith burns low, 

And men are timid grown, 
Hold fast thy loyalty, and know 

That Truth still moveth on. 

For unseen messengers she hath 

To work her will and ways, 
And even human scorn and wrath 

God turneth to her praise. 

She can both meek and lordly be, 

In heavenly might secure ; 
With her is pledge of victory, 

And patience to endure. 

The race is not unto the swift, 

The battle to the strong, 
When dawn her judgment-days that sift 

The claims of riyht and wrone:. 



48 LOYALTY 

And more than thou canst do for Truth 

Can she on thee confer, 
If thou. heart, but give thy youth 

And manhood unto her. 

For she can make thee inly bright, 

Thy self-love purge away, 
And lead thee in the path whose light 

Shines to the perfect day. 

Who follow her, though men deride, 
In her strength shall be strong ; 

Shall see their shame become their pride, 
And share her triumph-song ! 

1881 



PASSING UNDERSTANDING 

The peace of God, that passeth all understanding.* 

Many things in life there are 
Past our ' understanding ' far, 
And the humblest flower that grows 
Hides a secret no man knows. 

All unread by outer sense 
Lies the souPs experience ; 
Mysteries around us rise, 
We, the deeper mysteries ! 

Who hath scales to weigh the love 
That from heart to heart doth move, 
The divine unrest within, 
Or the keen remorse for sin ? 

Who can map those tracks of light 
Where the fancy wings its flight, 
Or to outer vision trace 
Thought's mysterious dwelling-place ? 
4 



50 PASSING UNDERSTANDING 

Who can sound the silent sea 
Where, with sealed orders, we 
Voyage from birth's forgotten shore 
Toward the unknown land before 1 

While we may so little scan 
Of thy vast creation's plan, 
Teach us, our God, to be 
Humble in our walk with thee ! 

May we trust, through ill and good, 
Thine unchanging Fatherhood, 
And our highest wisdom find 
In the reverent heart and mind ! 

Clearer vision shall be ours. 
Larger wisdom, ampler powers, 
And the meaning yet appear 
Of what passes knowledge here. 



THE SUNNY SIDE 

A SILVERY tide, called * Sunny Side,* 

Goes creeping around the earth, 
And never a place but wins a grace 

In the jubilant flood of mirth, 
From the dancing gleam on the fretted 
stream 

To the dimple on baby's cheek, 
That in and out, to his merry shout, 

Twinkles a hide-and-seek. 

Wherever it goes, the darkness glows 

And men and women sing ; 
It fills their eyes with a glad surprise, 

And stays their sorrowing ; 
The heart is a-tune, the world is June, 

Nothing is old or gray, 
As it passes along with the swell of a song, 

Like a musical break of day. 



62 THE SUNNY SIDE 

Spirit of Love, in the blue above 

Who makest the sun to flame, 
Who guidest the flight of the planet bright, 

And callest the stars by name, 
It is thou dost hide in the ' Sunny Side,' 

And creepest from heart to heart 1 
And, soul or clod, we share the God, 

Who comes, — and the shadows part ! 

1875 



FLOWER SUNDAY 

The rose is queen among the flowers, 

None other is so fair : 
The lily nodding on her stem 

With fragrance fills the air. 
But sweeter than the lily's breath 

And than the rose more fair, 
The tender love of human hearts 

That springeth everywhere. 

The rose will fade and fall away, 

The lily too will die : 
But love shall live for evermore 

Beyond the starry sky. 
Then sweeter than the lily's breath 

And than the rose more fair, 
The tender love of human hearts 

Upspringing everywhere. 

1875 



THE LITTLE ONES 

Children's Sunday 

All hidden lie the future ways 
Their little feet shall fare ; 

But holy thoughts within us stir 
And rise on lips of prayer. 

To us beneath the noonday heat, 
Dust-stained and travel- worn, 

How beautiful their robes of white, 
The freshness of their morn I 

Within us wakes the childlike heart, 
Back rolls the tide of years ; 

The silent wells of memory start 
And flow in happy tears. 

little ones, ye cannot know 
The power with which ye plead, 

Nor why, as on through life we go. 
The little child doth lead. 



CHRISTMAS 

Still tlie angels sing on high, 
Still the bearded men draw nigh, 
Bringing worship with the morn, 
When a little child is born ; 
Baby-glory in the place, 
Star-look on the mother's face, 
Psalm within the mother's heart, — 
Christmas all in counterpart ! 

Quaintest wight that ever stirred, 
With thy ears that never heard, 
Eyes that eye a brand-new world, 
Tiny limbs but half uncurled. 
Wee-bit Adam ! wee-bit Christ ! 
Earth, by thee new-paradised , 
Blooms to miracles again, 
Echoes God's ' Good- will to men ! * 



56 CHRISTMAS 

Blessings on the little child 
In the cave far-off and wild ! 
For that nursery divine 
Tells me well, baby mine, 
That fkou art Emmanuel, 
* God with ws,' come here to dwell, 
Come to say, ' Since time began. 
Son of God is Son of Man.* 

1876 



THE CHILDEEN'S SERVICE 

From the German of Karl GeroTe 

The churcli-bells for service are ringing, 
The father and mother have gone ; 

And three little golden-haired children 
Are left in the doorway alone. 

For these are too young for the meeting — 
The busy and frolicsome elves — 

So they think to praise God like their elders 
With a holy-time all by themselves 1 

Each one a big volume has taken 

And holds it top-down 'gainst the breast ; 

Forthwith the devout little mimics 
Sing out in their loudest and best ! 

They know not themselves what they 're 
singing, 

And each takes a tune of his own : — 
Sing on, ye children, your voices 

Are heard at the heavenly throne ! 



58 THE CHILDREN'S SERVICE 

And there stand your angels in glory, 
While songs to the Father they raise, 

Who out of the mouths of the children 
Hath perfected worship and praise. 

Sing on ; over there in the garden 
There singeth an answering choir ; 

'T is the brood of light-hearted birdlings 
That chirp in the bloom-laden brier. 

Sing on ; there is trust in your music, — 
The Father, he asks not for more ; 

Quick flieth the heart that is sinless 
Like a dove to the heavenly door. 

Sing on ; we sing who are older, 
Yet little we too understand : 

And our Bibles, how often we hold them 
The bottom-side up in our hand ! 

Sing on ; in the songs of our service 
We follow each note of the card ; 

But alas, in our strife with each other 
How oft is the melody marred ! 



THE CHILDREN'S SERVICE 69 

Sing on ; for earth's loftiest music 
Though ever so fine and so clear, 

What is it ? The lisping of children, 
A breath in the Infinite ear ! 



1877 



JESUS fVHO? 

'The other day I told' my very little dnughter, answering 
a question of hers, that a certain picture was Jesus. "Jesus 
WHO ? " said she — " Jesus God ? " ' 

And are the children prophets, then, 

Or have they lived before, 
To speak the words so simple-wise, 

And babble spirit-lore ? 

Their wonder plays on questions quaint, 

All vision and surprise, 
Like clumsy gates whose careless swing 

Reveals hall' Paradise, 



Yes, little May^ you 've said it, — 
* God ' is his other name ; 

Ours always ends with Father's ; 
Yours is the very same. 



JESUS WHO? 61 

Our earth is one home only, 

Our Father only one, 
A.nd all the folks are brothers, 

And every one his son. 

And up and dowoi the city 

Wherever you have trod, 
It 's Mary-, Maud-, and Katy-, 

John-God, and Willie-God. 



Life and Love, in whom we are, 
From whom, to whom all lives, 

1 thank thee for the christening 
Thy little prophet gives. 

The simple Bible long ago 

Hinted the secret well, 
When child-faith named its hero-babes, 

* Judah ' and ' Israel.' ^ 

Why strangely sounds the name divine 
Blending with ours to-day ? 

Is God an ancient lost afar, 
A fashion gone for aye ? 

* ' Judah,' i. e.^ Praise God : ' Israel/ i. e., God strives. 



JESUS WHO? 

Ah, no, but thought too awful grows 
For name or speech or look : 

In silent floods the secret pours 
That babbled in the brook. 



1871 



CHRISTMAS 

To-day be joy in every heart, 

For lo, the angel throng 
Once more above the listening earth 

Repeats the advent song ; 

* Peace on the earth, good- will to men ! ' 

Before us goes the star 
That leads us on to holier births 

And life diviner far ! 

Ye men of strife, forget to-day 
Your harshness and your hate ; 

Too long ye stay the promised years 
For which the nations wait ! 

And ye upon the tented field. 

Sheathe, sheathe to-day the sword ! 

By love, and not by might, shall come 
The kingdom of the Lord. 



64 CHRISTMAS 

star of human faith and hope ! 

Thy light shall lead us on, 
Until it fades in morning's glow, 

And heaven on earth is won. 

1877 



JESUS 

Immortal by their deed and word. 

Like light around them shed, 
Still speak the prophets of the Lord, 

Still live the sainted dead. 

The voice of old by Jordan's flood 

Yet floats upon the air ; 
We hear it in beatitude, 

In parable and prayer. 

And still the beauty of that life 
Shines star-like on our way, 

And breathes its calm amid the strife 
And burden of to-day. 

Earnest of life forevermore, 

That life of duty here, — 
The trust that in the darkest hour 

Looked forth and knew no fear ! 
5 



66 JESUS 

Spirit of Jesus, still speed on ! 

Speed on thy conquering way, 
Till every heart the Father own, 

And all his will obey 1 

1880 



THE YEAR OF THE LORD 

Praise to God and thanksgiving ! 
Hearts, bow down, and voices, sing ! 
Praises to tlie Glorious One, 
All his year of wonder done ! 

Praise him for his budding green, 
April's resurrection-scene : 
Praise him for his shining hours, 
Starring all the land with flowers : 

Praise him for his summer rain, 
Feeding, day and night, the grain : 
Praise him for his tiny seed. 
Holding all his world shall need I 

Praise him for his garden root, 
Meadow grass and orchard fruit : 
Praise for hills and valleys broad, — 
Each the Table of the Lord ! 



68 THE YEAR OF THE LORD 

Praise liim now for snowy rest, 
Falling soft on Nature's breast : 
Praise for liappy dreams of birth 
Brooding in the q^uiet earth ! 

For his year of wonder done, 
Praise to the All-Glorious One ! 
Hearts, bow down, and voices, sing 
Praise and love and thanksgiving ! 

Harvest Festival, St. Paul, 1882 



THE NEW YEAR 

* Behold,' — in vision said 
The Voice to John on Patmos — 

* I make all things new ! ' 
Vanish before his view 
The earth and heavens old ; 
In splendor manifold 

New heavens and earth appear 

To the enraptured seer: 

And lo ! descending from the skies, 

Fairer than storied paradise, 

He saw the New Jerusalem, — 

Apparelled as a bride 

With gold and precious gem, — 

And heard a Voice that cried : 

' God's dwelling is with men. 

And he will wipe away all tears. 

And death shall be no more, nor pain 



70 THE NEW YEAR 

Passed are the things of former years : 

Behold, I make all things new ! 

Write: for faithful are these words and true. 

So speaks to thee, O heart, 

As the swift years depart 

The re-creating Voice. 

Turn not in vain regret 

To thy fond yesterdays, 

But rather forward set 

Thy face toward the untrodden ways. 

Open thine eyes to see 

The good in store for thee, — 

New love, new thought, new service too 

For him who dail}'- niaketh thy life new. 

Nor think thou aught is lost 

Or left behind upon the silent coast 

Of thy spent years ; 

Give o'er thy faithless fears, 

Whate'er of real good — 

Of thought, or deed, or holier mood — 

Thy life hath known 

Abideth still thine own, 

And. hath within significance 



THE NEW YEAR 71 

Of more than Time's inheritance. 

Thy good is prophecy 

Of better still to be. 

In the future thou shalt find 

How far the Fact hath left behind 

Thy fondest Dream ; how deeper than all 
sense 

Or thought of thine, thy life's sure Provi- 
dence 1 



1881 



THE DAY 

Routine of duties, 
Commonplace cares, — 

Angels disguised 
Entertained unawares ;- 

Sweet human fellowsliips 

Kindred and near, 
Drawing the soul from 

Its self atmosphere ; 

The book's friendly company, 

Leading along 
To fields of new knowledge 

And uplands of song ; 

In-shinings of Nature, 

Morning's red bars, 
Waysides in beauty, 

Night with its stars j 



THE DAY 73 

The nearer conimunion 

In silence apart, 
When thought blooms to prayer 

And song fills the heart, 

While the things unseen 

Grow more and more real, 
And life deepens and broadens 

Toward larger ideal : — 

How many the blessings 

Each day has to give 
The soul that is seeking 

Truly to live! 



1885 



THE HILLS OF THE LORD 

God ploughed one day with an earthquake, 

And drove his furrows deep ! 
The huddling plains upstarted, 

The hills were all a-leap ! 

But that is the mountain's secret, 

Age-hidden in their breast ; 
• God's peace is everlasting,' 

Are the dream-words of their rest. 

He hath made them the haunt of beauty, 

The home elect of his grace ; 
He spreadeth his mornings on them, 

His sunsets light their face. 

His thunders tread in music 

Of footfalls echoing long, 
A.nd carry majestic greeting 

Around the silent throng. 



THE HILLS OP THE LORD 75 

His winds bring messages to them, 
Wild storm-news from the main ; 

They sing it down to the valleys 
In the love-song of the rain. 

Green tribes from far come trooping, 
And over the uplands flock ; 

He weaveth the zones together 
In robes for his risen rock. 

They are nurseries for young rivers ; 

Nests for his flying cloud ; 
Homesteads for new-born races, 

Masterful, free, and proud. 

The people of tired cities 

Come up to their shrines and pray ; 
God freshens again within them. 

As he passes by all day. 

And lo, I have caught their secret, 

The beauty deeper than all, 
This faith, — that life's hard moments, 

When the jarring sorrows befall, 



76 THE HILLS OP THE LORD 

Are but God ploughing his mountains ; 

And the mountains yet shall be 

The source of his grace and freshness 

And his peace everlasting to me. 

Whitefield, 1870 



SUNDAY ON THE HILL-TOP 

Only ten miles from the city, — 
And how I am lifted away 

To the peace that passeth knowing, 
And the light that is not of day ! 

All alone on the hill-top ! 

Nothing but God and me, 
And the spring-time's resurrection, 

Far shinings of the sea. 

The river's laugh in the valley, 
Hills dreaming of their past ; 

And all things silently opening, 
Opening into the Yast ! 

Eternities past and future 
Seem clinging to all I see, 

And things immortal cluster 
Around my bended knee. 



78 SUNDAY ON THE HILL-TOP 

That pebble — is older than Adam ! 

Secrets it hath to tell ; 
These rocks — they cry out history, 

Could I but listen well. 

That pool knows the ocean-feeling 
Of storm and moon-led tide ; 

The sun finds its East and West therein, 
And the stars find room to glide. 

That lichen's crinkled circle 
Creeps with the Life Divine, 

Where the Holy Spirit loitered 
On its way to this face of mine, — 

On its way to the shining faces 

Where angel-lives are led, 
And / am the lichen's circle 

That creeps with the tiny tread. 

I can hear these violets chorus 
To the sky's benediction above: — 

And we all are together lying 
On the bosom of Infinite Love. 



SUNDAY ON THE HILL-TOP 79 

I — I am a part of the poem, 
Of its every sight and sound ; 

For my heart beats inward rhymings 
To the Sabbath that lies around. 

Oh, the peace at the heart of Nature ! 

Oh, the light that is not of day ! 
Why seek it afar forever, 

When it cannot be lifted away f 

Blue Hill, May 21, 1871 



THE CATHEDRAL 

Shelf over shelf the mountain rose ; 
And, as we climbed, they seemed the stair 
That scales a minster's wall to seek 
Some high-hid cell of prayer. 

But every stair was carpeted 
With mosses soft of gray and green, 
And gold and crimson arabesques 
Trailed in and out between. 

Up, up, o*er ferny pavements still, 
O'er dim mosaics of the wood. 
O'er rocky terraces, we trod, 
Till on the height we stood. 

About the ancient mountain-walls 
The silent wildernesses clung ; 
In solemn frescos, moving slow. 
The clouds their shadows flung. 



THE CATHEDRAL 81 

Along the valley-deeps below 
The shimmer of a forest floor, — 
A leafy brightness, like the sea, 
Wide twinkling o'er and o'er. 

Niched in the mighty minster, we, 
Beneath the dome of radiant blue : 
Cathedral-hush on every side, 
And worship breathing through ! 

There came wild music on the winds. 
The chanting of the forest choir, 
Shaken across the ranged hills 
As over a chorded lyre. 

Then pauses as for quiet prayer. 
And lulls, in which the listeners heard 
Home- voices speak, while faces neared 
Swifter than any bird. 

Of Strength eternal, by whose will 
The hills their steadfast places keep, 
Whose Eight is like the mountains high. 
Whose Judgments are a deep, — 
6 



82 THE CATHEDRAL 

In grand old Bible verse we spoke, 
And following close like echoes sped 
The poems best beloved. The words 
Along the silence fled. 

The Silence, awful Living Word 
Behind all sound, behind all thought, 
Whose speech is Nature-yet-to-be, 
The Poem yet unwrought ! 

That day it spake within the soul. 
Through sense all strangely blent with sbnse. 
The vision took majestic rhythm, — 
We heard the firmaments I 

And listened, time and space forgot, 
As flowed the lesson for the day, — 
* Order is Beauty ; Law is Love ; 
Childlike his worlds obey.' 

And all the heaven seemed folding down 
Above the shining earth's sweet face, 
Till in our hearts they touched ! We, felt 
The thrill of their embrace. 



THE CATHEDRAL 83 

Then, in its peace, we wandered down 
Our rocky staircase from the height ; 
On dini mosaics of the wood 
We met the climbing Night. 

Sunday on * Bald Cap,' September, 1876 



THE PAST 

For us no Past ? Nay, what is present sweet- 
ness 
But yesterdays dissolving in to-day ? 
No Past ? It flowers in every new complete- 
ness, 
And scarce from eye and ear can hide away. 

These berries, mottling blue the rocky hol- 
lows, 
Still cluster with the blossom-trick of June ; 
The cloud-led shadow loiters there and fol- 
lows 
O'er crags sun-stained by centuries of noon ; 
Yon aged pine waves young defiant gesture 
When hustling winds pant by in wild sea- 
mood ; 
The valley's grace in all its shining vesture, — 
Ages have carved it from the solitude ; 



THE PAST 85 

Low sings the stream in murmurs faint re- 
calling 
The chant of floods the solitude once heard; 
And this wide quiet on the hill-tops falling 
Made hush at eves that listener never 
stirred. 

And as on %is it falls, our laughter stilling, 

Dim echoes cross it of all old delight! 
The joy, along the soul's far reaches thrilling 

To glory of the summer day and night. 
Has been inwrought by many a summer-hour 

Of past selves long forgot, — enrichment 
slow, 
Attuning mind and heart with mystic power 

To the fresh marvel of this sunset's glow. 
I think we see our valley's brightness brighter 

For faces that once brightened by our side ; 
The peace of the eternal mountains deepens 
At thought of peace on faces that have died. 

For us no Past ? Nay, what is present sweet- 
ness? 
Dear yesterdays dissolving in to-day ! 



86 THE PAST 

The Past — it flowers in every new complete- 
ness 
Of thouglit, faith, hope ; and so shall be for 
aye. 

Sunset on * Crow Nest,' August, 1875 



SUMMER CHEMISTRY 

WTiat does it take 

A day to make, — 

A day at the Bear Camp Ossipee ? 

White clouds a-sail in the shining blue, 

Dropping a shadow to dredge the lands ; 

A mountain-wind, and a marching storm. 

And a sound in the trees like waves on 

sands ; 
A mist to soften the shaggy side 
Of the great green hill, till it lies as dim 
As the hills in a childhood memory ; 
The crags and the ledges silver-chased. 
Where yesterday's rainy runlets raced ; 
The back of an upland pasture steep, 
With delicate fern-beds notching wide 
The dark wood-line where the birches keep 
Candlemas all the summer-tide ; 
Brown-flashing across the meadow bright 
The stream that gems its malachite; 
And, watching his valley, Chocorua grim, 
And a golden sunset watching him ! 



88 SUMMER CHEMISTRY 

Add — fifty lives of young and old, 
Of tired and sad, of strong and bold, 
And every heart a deeper sea 
Than its own owner dreams can be ; 
Add eyes whose glances have the law 
Of coursing planets in their draw ; 
Add careless hands that touch and part. 
And hands that greet with a heaven's sense ; 
Add little children in their glee 
Uprunning to a mother's knee, 
Their earliest altar ; add her heart, 
Their feeble, brooding Providence : — 

Add this to that, and thou shalt see 

What goes to summer chemistry, — 

What the God takes. 

Each time he makes 

One summer-day at Ossipee. 

Bear Camp River House, West Ossipie, 
August, 1877 



WHERE DID IT GO? 

Where did yesterday's sunset go, 
When it faded down the hills so slow, 
And the gold grew dim, and the purple light 
Like an army with banners passed from 

sight 1 
Will its flush go into the golden-rod, 
Its thrill to the purple aster's nod, 
Its crimson fleck the maple-bough. 
And the Autumn-glory begin from now ? 

Deeper than flower-fields sank the glow 
Of the silent pageant passing slow. 

It flushed all night in many a dream. 
It thrilled in the folding hush of prayer, 
It glided into a poet's song, 
It is setting still in a picture rare ; 



90 WHERE DID IT GO ? 

It changed by the miracle none can see 
To the shifting lights of a symphony ; 
And in resurrections of faith and hope 
The glory died on the shining slope. 

For it left its light on the hills and seas 
That rim a thousand memories. 

West Ossipee, 1877 



EECOGNITION 

Twice have I turned to hear a tone, 

And thrice have I seen a look, 
That tell me well the soul that I love 

Is to me but a sealed book. 

'T was only the name of her little child, 
And a ' Darling ! ' one day as she kissed ; 

But twice those household words were strains 
Out of exquisite music missed. 

I remember the raptured hour she stood 

With love-light haloing her, 
When her lips were dim in the crimson tides 

From the deeps of joy astir : 

And once, 'mid the pain of farewell tears 

For an exile seaward doomed, 
How her form upreached like a quivering 
stem 

And a new face suddenly bloomed : 



92 RECOGNITION 

And then, a day in a shaded room, 
A day in the valley of Death ; — 
She must journey and wrestle alone, — and 



we 



We waited with bated breath, 

Until the radiant marvel broke 

Of her resurrection-face, 
And the weary eyes, her victory won, 

So peacefully filled with grace. 

Three days that star-look on us beamed, 
And the bed was a holy shrine, 

Where soft we worshipped the new-born 
Child 
(yerhung by the Mother's sign ! 

Slowly it faded, and welcome grew 
For the old dear eyes returned, — 

The light of our home, but not the eyes 
Where the angel-look had burned. 



Do you wonder an awe enfolds my love 
For the presence with whom I dwell, — 

My inmost friend, but a stranger too. 
Whom I know not over well ? 



RECOGNITION 93 

Her soul to me is an Upper Land, 

Where mornings rise unseen 
On pathless mountain-mysteries 

And dells of hidden green. 

I am so glad of her gardens sweet 

Too sacred for me to walk, 
So glad of the sunlit heights too far 

To echo our mingled talk ! 

And I try to climb and listen and watch ; 

For may he the sense will grow, 
Till into her loneliness I may press 

And all of her sweetness know ! 



A marvel ! But what if there be a truth 

Passing in wonder this ? 
Can she be to herself as dim, unknown, 

And the best of her nature miss ? 

Can there be in us all those heights of will 
And shadowy deeps of thought, 

A land in the heart of each one's life 
With self-surprises fraught, — 



94 RECOGNITION 

Whither, in sudden mystical hours 
When the conscious self is forgot, 

We are rapt as into an upper self, 
And stand in the light of a spot, 

Where are born those exquisite tones that 
stray- 
To startle the common days, 

And the look that heralds our angel-smile 
Dawns into our eyes and ways ? 

Only a minute, — and then we are hack 

In the meadows far below, 
Where the life-winds sweep and the life- 
streams run. 

And nought of their source we know ! 

I verily think that she I love 
Would hardly a meaning trace. 

Should I speak to her of that twice-heard 
tone 
And the thrice-iUumined face. 



1872 



IN A LOOK 

All the Morning in a face, — 
Fresliness of all happy space I 
Sense of sunrise in a sky 
Serious still with stars gone by ; 
Sense of song in waking woods, 
Winds a-laugh in solitudes, 
Dawn surprising dewy fields. 
Springing sounds as slumber yields, 
Breaths of prayer, the rush of wings, 
Morning, deep with happy things I 



Summer Twilight in a face ! 
Evening shadows stilling space j 
Two stars in a silent sky ; 
After- calm, — a sun gone by ; 
Wood-paths darkening, bird-song closing, 
Flowers on their stems reposing ; 



96 IN A LOOK 

Widening, widening, from the grass 
Ehythmic tides of music pass, — 
Pass within, and hush the streams. 
Whose thought-babble dies in dreams! 



These before me seem to rise. 
When they look me in the eyes. 



THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 

W. H. F. 

Fifty times the years have turned, 
Since the heart within him burned 
With its wistfulness to be 
An apostle sent of thee. 

Closely in his Master's tread 
Still to follow, till he read 
Tone of voice and look of face, 
Print of wound and sign of grace. 

Reading there for fifty years, 
Pressing after, till the tears 
And the smiles would come and go 
At the self-same joy and woe, — 

Sharing with him shouts of ' Mad 1' 
When the bold front to the bad 
Bent to pluck the 'little ones' 
From the feet of fellow-sons, — 
7 



93 THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 

Sharing in his inner peace, 
Sharing all but his release, — 
He is with us while the chimes 
Ring our blessing fifty times. 

Listening boys across the field 
Hear, and hope they may not yield : 
Are they listening from the air, — 
Boys who started with him there ? 

Philadelphia, 1875 



THE TEACHER 

G. R. N. 

A LIGHT Upon the harvest-field, 
A ' Well-done I ' in the air : 

' Rest- Angel, only iveary yield ! ' 
Rose up his eager prayer. 

Again in work went by the day, 
Till working hands grew thin ; 

Once more the restful shining lay, — 
The old man entered in. 

A teacher he, in white-haired youth ; 

The body's cloister, old, — 
The spirit growing young with Truth 

Through birthdays manifold. 

A teacher he of oracles, 
And one his life did sing : 

The field lies always Harvest-ivhite, 
If inly lies the Spring. 

Cambkidge, 1868 



THE CLIFF AT NEWPORT 

I WALK the Cliff, in earlier days oft trod 
By one whose advent brought new life to 

men ; 
A prophet of the soul, speaking again 
To earth-bound hearts of the deep things of 

God. 
Below, the passionate sea still beats in vain, 
And white sails gleam along the horizon 

broad ; 
The same sky bends above — beneath, the 

sod 
As then is freshened by the Summer rain. 
But, interfused with all, there shines to-day 
A beauty born not of the earth or skies, 
Making twice fair what was so fair before : 
'T is that a noble Soul has passed this way, 
Leaving a holy memory to rise 
And speak to thought and feeling evermore. 

1884 



IN SLEEP 

L. N. R. 

• He giveth his Moved (in) sleep.' 

Not in our waking hours alone 
His constancy and care are known ; 
But locked in slumber fast and deep 
He giveth to us while we sleep. 

What giveth He ? From toil release, 
Quiet from God, night's starlit peace ; 
Till with the coming of the morn 
We greet the day, like it new-born. 

And pondering this mystery, 
There came a larger truth to me, — 
How in the sleep that we call death 
He sleepeth not nor slumbereth, 

But still sustains the silent soul 
Until the shadows backward roll, 
And with the passing of the night 
It wakens in immortal light! 



102 IN SLEEP 

What giveth He ? No more again 
To know the touch of mortal pain ; 
All weakness past, each fetter riven, — 
For earth the larger life of heaven ! 

Dear friend, as o'er thy pallid face 
The tall white lilies breathed their peace, 
And stillness like a solitude 
Enwrapt the tearful multitude, 

How sweetly on that sea of calm 
Floated the music of the psalm, — 
The Spirit's voice upon the deep, — 
' He giveth his beloved sleep ! ' 

Once more the sun with lavish hand 
Pours lengthening day along the land ; 
But not with spring-time bloom and bird 
Thy smile returns, thy voice is heard : 

Yet still we say the old-time words 
' In life, in death, we are the Lord's : ' 
And trust thee to his love to keep 
Who giveth to his own in sleep. 

March 16, 1877 



MINISTRY 

E. A. B. 

Just on the threshold of threescore-and- 
ten — 
An upward pathway, shining more and 

more — 
She heard the call, and passed within the 
door 
Whence none that enters ever comes again. 
Henceforth will Want await her step in vain, 
Wise Charity will have a lessened store : 
The beatings of a faithful heart are o'er, 
And struggling Truth has lost a loyal brain. 
Ah, foolish plaint! Hath God no other 
sphere 
For virtue's use, and love, and loyalty, 
That they should perish with the body's 
breath ? 
noble Friend, thy life's long service here 
Thou crownest now with its best ministry. 
And quickenest faith beside the door of 

death ! 
November, 1879 



THE MINISTER'S JOURNEY 

Not to the lanes of England, 
Cathedral-aisles of France, 

Or up the mountain-hollows 
Where Alpine torrents glance ; 

Not in the storied cities 
And old highways of life, 

Where shadowy generations 
Have passed in song and strife ; 

Where Raphael hath painted, 

Or Socrates was born, 
Or prophets once were cradled 

In Nazareths of scorn ; — 

But on more wonderful journeys 
Than any the pilgrims know, 

Our traveller has been roving, — 
The book in his heart can sho\Y 



THE MINISTER'S JOURNEY 105 

He has voyaged with the Captains 
Who sail the seas of thought, 

Daring with them the tempest, 
Hailing with them the port. 

And many a dreamer's island 

Has added to his lore 
The hope that made it Patmos, — 

One heavenly vision more. 

In lands men deemed unholy 

He gleaned from every clod 
Some treasure-trove, revealing 

Horizons new of God. 

Till Heathenesse grew homelike ; 

While the traveller's tale was still 
Of a Ceaseless Care, whose presence 

Out-worketh good from ill. 

And unto sacred places. 

The Palestines within, 
By pathways of the Spirit, 

Our traveller hath been. 



106 THE MINISTER'S JOURNEY 

Along the silent beaches 

That men call Birth and Death, 
Rimming our fields of summer, 

Giving us ocean-breath, 

He paces as a watcher 

Watching the tidal sweep ; 

And his greeting is full of music 
Caught from the central deep. 

He knows the founts of laughter ; 

Where psalms in mothers rise ; 
How purpose dawns in manhood, 

And love in maiden eyes. 

In still lanes of confession, 
In solemn aisles of prayer. 

On Alps of high endeavor, — 
We meet him everywhere ! 

The others see but Europe, 
And go as feet may fare ; 
■ Our pilgrim, still out-sailing, 
Sees many an Outre-Merl 

To J. W. C, December 19, 1884 



IN TWOS 

Somewhere in the world there hide 
Garden-gates that no one sees 
Save they come in happy twos, — 
Not in ones, nor yet in threes. 

But from every maiden's door 
Leads a pathway straight and true ; 
Map and survey know it not, — 
He who finds, finds room for two I 

Then they see the garden-gates ! 
Never skies so blue as theirs, 
Never flowers so many-sweet. 
As for those who come in pairs. 

Round and round the alleys wind : 
Now a cradle bars the way. 
Now a little mound, behind, — 
So the two go through the day. 



108 IN TWOS 

When no nook in all the lanes 
But has heard a song or sigh, 
Lo ! another garden-gate 
Opens as the two go by. 

In they wander, knowing not ; 
* Five and Twenty I ' fiUs the air 
With a silvery echo low, 
All about the startled pair. 

Happier yet these garden-walks : 
Closer, heart to heart, they lean ; 
Stiller, softer, falls the light; 
Few the twos, and far between. 

Till, at last, as on they pass 
Down the paths so well they know, 
Once again at hidden gates 
Stand the two : they enter slow. 

Golden Gates of ' Fifty Years,' 
May our two your latchet press ! 
Garden of the Sunset Land, 
Hold their dearest happiness 1 



IN TWOS 109 

Then a quiet walk again : 
Then a wicket in the wall: 
Then one, stepping on alone, — 
Then two at the Heart of All I 



December 22, 1879 



POEM AND DOGMA 

'T WAS Schliemann back from Troy, 
With relics bronze and gold : 

Where other eyes saw violets, 
He saw the city old. 

And, fondling a brown skull, — 
' My learned friend,' said he, 

* Tells me that this a maiden's was, 
In Troy beyond the sea ; 

And from these angles here 
Of brow and cheek-bone fine. 

He judges that my maiden was 
A creature quite divine. 

*Ah, yes ! ' he added low, 

' Virchow was right just there. 

For all the maidens of old Troy 
Were beautiful and rare.' 



POEM AND DOGMA 111 

By summer chance we met, 

And sat in chatting mood : 
Said one, ' How noble Jesus' word 

In that Beatitude!' 

* Ah, yes ! ' chimed in a friend, 

' You speak it truly there, 
For all that Jesus said or was, 

Was right beyond compare.' 

'And Paul,' one said, * was wrong; 

How far from light he trod ! ' — 
' But then, you know,' my lady chirped, 

"T is a« the Word of God.' ' 



The artlessness the same ! 

And why should tears half-start 
Over the fabled beauty gone, — 

Poem of German heart ; 

While, with half-angry thought, 

I smile away the creed 
Of fabled beauty they would fain 

Persuade me that I need ? 



112 POEM AND DOGMA 

Angry ! who know their creeds 
Were poems, too, — that died ; 

That all the world's old dogmas are 
Its poems petrified. 

1881 



THE HALO 

' One London dealer in birds received, when the fashion 
was at its height, a single consignment of thirty-two thou- 
sand dead humming-birds ; and another received at on* 
time thirty thousand aquatic birds, and three hundred thou- 
sand pairs of wings.' 

Think what a price to pay, 
Faces so bright and gay, 
Just for a hat ! 
Flowers unvisited, mornings unsung, 
Sea-ranges bare of the wings that o'er- 
swung, — 
Bared just for that! 

Think of the others, too, 
Others and mothers, too, 
Bright-Eyes in hat ! 
Hear you no mother-groan floating in air, 
Hear you no little moan, — birdlings' de- 
spair, — 
Somewhere, for that '? 
8 



114 THE HALO 

Caught 'mid some mother- work. 
Torn by a huuter Turk, 
Just for your hat ! 
Plenty of mother-heart yet in the world: 
All the more wings to tear, carefully twii'led ! 
Women want that ? 

Oh, but the shame of it, 
Oh, but the blame of it, — 
Price of a hat ! 
Just for a jauntiness brightening the street ! 
This is your halo, faces so sweet, — 
Death : and for that ! 



1S85 



NOT ALL THERE 

• The innocents, of whom the Scotch say, " They are not 
all there."' 

Something short in the making, — 

Something lost on the way, 
As the little Soul was taking 

Its path to the break of Day ! 

Only his mood or passion, 

But it twitched an atom back ; 

And she, for her gods of fashion, 
Filched from the pilgrim's pack. 

The Father did not mean it, 

The Mother did not know, 
No human eye had seen it, — 

But the little Soul needed it so ! 



Through the street there passed a cripple, 
Maimed from before its birth ; 

On the strange face gleamed a ripple, 
Like a half-dawn on the earth. 



116 NOT ALL THERE 

It passed, — and it awed the city, 
As one not alive nor dead : 

Eyes looked and brimmed with pity, 
* He is not all there/ they said. 

Not all ! for part is behind it, 
Lying dropt on the way : 

That part — could two but find it, 
How welcome the end of Day ! 

1883 



LET IT BEGIN HERE 

Captain Parker's words on Lexington Green : ' Don't 
fire, unless you are fired on; but if they ivant a war, let it 
begin here ! ' 

The April thrills along the hills, 

The violets wake below, 
But never to the thrill they knew 

A hundred years ago, 
What day the calls from pasture-walls 

In echoing signals ran, 
And swift replied the country-side 

To what they here began. 

* Let it begin ! ' a Voice within 

The waiting farmers spake, — 
His voice in whom the Aprils bloom, 

In whom the Nations wake ! 
Old lands had yearned, old dreamers burned 

Fair Freedom's day to win, 
And still it fled, — the farmers said, 

* Now let it here begin ! ' 



118 LET IT BEGIN HERE 

And at the word a Nation stirred ! 

Without or king or caste, 
Serene and strong to right their wrong, 

The People rose at last ! 
All quick to feel the common weal, 

The many in the one, 
Heart pledged to heart no more to part : 

And this was here begun ! 

For the Lexington Centennial, April 19, 1875 



AUNT PHILLIS'S GUEST 

Si. Helena Island in 1863 

I WAS young and ' Harry ' was strong, 
The summer was bursting from sky and 
plain, 
Thrilling our blood as we bounded along, — 
When a picture flashed, and I dropped the 
rein. 

A black sea-creek, with snaky run 
Slipping through low green leagues of 
sedge ; 

An ebbing tide, and a setting sun ; 
A hut and a woman by the edge. 

Her back was bent and her wool was gray; 

The wrinkles lay close on the withered face; 
Children were buried and sold away, — 

The Freedom had come to the last of a race ' 



120 AUNT PHILLIS'S GUEST 

She lived from a neighbor's hominy-pot ; 
And praised the Lord, if 'the pain ' passed 
by; 
From the earthen floor the smoke curled out 
Through shingles patched with the bright 
blue sky. 

< Aunt Phillis, you live here all alone 1 ' 
I asked, and pitied the gray old head ; 

Sure as a child, in quiet tone, 
* Me and Jesus, Massa,' she said. 

I started, for all the place was aglow 
With a presence I had not seen before ; 

The air was full of a music low, 

And the Guest Divine stood at the door ! 

Ay, it was true that the Lord of Life, 
Who seeth the widow give her mite, 

Had watched this slave in her weary strife. 
And shown himself to her longing sight. 

The hut and the dirt, the rags and the skin, 
The grovelling want and the darkened 
mind, — 



AUNT PHILLIS'S GUEST 121 

I looked on this ; but the Lord, within : 
I would what he saw was in me to find ! 

A childlike soul, whose faith had force 
To see what the angels see in bliss : 

She lived, and the Lord lived ; so, of course, 
They lived together, — she knew but this. 

And the life that I had almost despised 
As something to pity, so poor and low, 

Had already borne fruit that the Lord so 
prized 
He loved to come near and see it grow. 

No sorrow for her that the life was done : 
A few days more of the hut's unrest, 

A little while longer to sit in the sun, — 
Then — He would be host, and she would 
be guest ! 

And up above, if an angel of light 

Should stop on his errand of love some day 

To ask, ' Who lives in the mansion bright ? ' 
' Me and Jesus,' Aunt Phillis will say. 



122 AUNT PHILLIS'S GUEST 

A fancy, foolish and fond, does it seem 1 
And things are not as Aunt Phillises dream ? 

Friend, surely so ! 

For this I know, — 
That our faiths are foolish by falling below, 
Not coming above, what God will shov/ ; 
That his commonest thing hides a wonder 

vast, 
To whose beauty our eyes have never passed ; 
That his fact in the present, or in the to-be. 
Outshines the best that we think we see. 



THE NEGEO BURYING-GROUND 

St. Helena Island in 1863 

'Mid the sunny flat of the cotton-field 
Lies an acre of forest-tangle still ; 

A cloister dim, where the gray moss waves 
And the live-oaks lock their arms at will. 

Here in the shadows the slaves would hide 
As they dropped the hoe at death's release, 

And leave no sign but a sinking mound 
To show where they passed on their way 
to peace. 

This was the Gate — there was none but 
this — 

To a Happy Land where men were men ; 
And the dusky fugitives, one by one, 

Stole in from the bruise of the prison -pen. 

When, lo ! in the distance boomed the guns. 
The bruise was over, and 'Massa' had fled ! 

But Death is the ' Massa ' that never flees. 
So still to the oaks they bore the dead. 



124 THE NEGRO BURYING-GROUND 

'T was at set of sun ; a tattered troop 
Of children circled a little grave, 

Chanting an anthem rich in its peace 
As ever pealed in cathedral-nave, — 

The A, B, C, that the lips below 

Had learnt with them in the school to 
shout. 
Over and over they sung it slow, 

Crooning a mystic meaning out. 

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, — 

Down solemn alphabets they swept : 
The oaks leaned close, the moss swung low, — 
What strange new sound among them 
crept ? 

The holiest hymn that the children knew ! 
'T was dreams come real, and heaven come 
near ; 
'T was light, and liberty, and joy, 
And ' white-folks'-sense,' — and God right 
here ! 



THE NEGRO BURYING-GROUND 125 

Over and over ; they dimly felt 

This was the charm .could make black white, 
This was the secret of ' Massa's ' pride, 

And this, unknown, made the negro's night. 

What could they sing of braver cheer 
To speed on her unseen way the friend ? 

The children were facing the mystery Death 
With the deepest prayer that their hearts 
could send. 



Children, too, and the mysteries last ! 

We are but comrades with them there^ — 
Stammering over a meaning vast, 

Crooning our guesses of how and where. 

But the children were right with their A, B, C ; 

In our stammering guess so much we say ! 
The singers were happy, and so are we : 

Deep as our wants are the prayers we pray. 



GETTYSBURG IN 1885 

After a visit to the Panorama 

One step from the busy street, and there, 
With the summer hills around, 

In the heart of a summer day it lies, — 
A Battle without a sound. 

Whatever of battle the eyes may see — 

The sweep of men to death. 
The dash of horse, and the rush of gun. 

The musket's fiery breath ; 

The massing clouds of the cannon-smoke, 

The horror of bursting shell, 
The wreck of wheel and caisson, 

The surgeon's mimic hell ; 

The uptossed arms and the ashen cheek, 
The droop of the shattered limb. 

The men by the blood-pools in the grass, 
The bodies stiff and grim. 



GETTYSBURG IN 1883 127 

We see it all, and we hear no sound ! 

We listen for roar and boom, 
For the crack and the ping and the bullet's 
thud : — 

A stillness like the tomb ! 

No rattle to wheel, no clatter to hoof, 

No bugle-call or cry, 
No fierce hurrah along that line 

Where the columns press to die ; 

Those sullen prisoners give no oath ; 

The face in the grass no groan ; 
Its ' Good-b^^e ! ' reached a thousand mileS/ 

But we catch never a tone. 

Ah, if we could add sound to sight, 
And then could paint the strain 

And the splendor in the soldier's heart. 
Breasting death's hurricane, 

And the flashing signals of his thought 

To homes that signal back. 
And the woman's face and the climbing child 

That lie in the bullet's track ; 



128 GETTYSBURG IN 1883 

And the breathless pause, each pulse-beat 
hushed, 

Of a watching continent ; 
And the sense of a nation's fate at stake 

In the awful tournament ; 

And the upturned brows of a million slaves 

Reading the face of God 
For the word that would lift them into Men, 

Or doom them back to the Clod, — 

Could we rim all this in those summer hills 

And add to what eyes see, 
In the cloister quaint by the city street 

Then ' Gettysburg ' would be ! 



And yet, as I hark, the Boundlessness 
Seems song of the war's release, 

And the beauty to hint, 'mid Battle's woe, 
The Battle's after-peace. 



THE RIGHT GOES MARCHING ON 

For Decoration Day 

One moment on the scaffold, and he left it 

Holy Ground ! 
Three hundred thousand heroes now lie 

guarding it around, 
And reverent hearts are pilgrim still to many 

a sacred mound, — 
And the Right goes marching on ! 

God had counted up the slave-graves, and 
heard the black man's moan. 

Till at last his leaping thunder shook the 
awful Judgment-Throne, — 

* For each lash a cannon-crash ! For each 
cry a battle-groan ! ' — 
And the Right goes marching on. 

The Hands wherein the sparrow falls, that 

beckon to the star. 
Are Hands that harness unseen dooms to 

Wrong's triumphal car, 
9 



130 THE RIGHT GOES MARCHING ON 

And tlie steeds untiring draw the nations 
trembling to the Bar, — 
And the Right goes marching on ! 

Then, if perchance a nation's Soul from out 

her shame shall rise, 
And light of Justice kindle fresh within her 

chastened eyes, 
The God who dooms shall save her by the 

pain that purifies, — 
And the Right goes marching on ! 

Lo, the flowers are all a-blossom, and the 
grasses are a-wave 

Where the bodies of our hero dead are sleep- 
ing in the grave : 

So shall beauty crown salvation through the 
Hands so strong to save, — 
And the Right goes marching on ! 

1884 



OUR COUNTRY 

* Beautiful, my Country !' 

Be thine a nobler care 
Than all thy wealth of commerce, 

Thy harvests waving fair : 
Be it thy pride to lift up 

The manhood of the poor ; 
Be thou to the oppressed 

Fair Freedom's open door ! 

For thee our fathers suffered, 

For thee they toiled and prayed ; 
Upon thy holy altar 

Their willing lives they laid. 
Thou hast no common birthright. 

Grand memories on thee shine ; 
The blood of pilgrim nations 

Commingled flows in thine. 



132 OUR COUNTRY 

O Beautiful, our Country ! 

Round thee in love we draw ; 
Thine is the grace of Freedom, 

The majesty of Law. 
Be Righteousness thy sceptre, 

Justice thy diadem ; 
And on thy shining forehead 

Be Peace the crowning gem ! 



INDEX OF FIEST LINES 



Paqx 

A light upon the harvest-field 99 

All hidden lie the future ways 54 

All the Morning in a face 95 

And are the children prophets, then .... 60 

A silvery tide, called ' Sunny Side ' .... 51 

'Behold/ — in vision said 69 

Clear in memory's silent reaches 37 

Fairer grows the earth each morning .... 25 

Father, to thee we look in all our sorrow . . 39 

Fifty times the years have turned 97 

For us no Past ? Nay, what is present sweetness 84 

From heart to heart, from creed to creed . . 29 

God ploughed one day with an earthquake . . 74 

Go not, my soul, in search of him 19 

He hides within the lily 15 



134 INDEX OP FIRST LINES 

Page 

I cannot think of them as dead 35 

I hear it often in the dark 11 

I little see, I little know 23 

Immortal by their deed and word .... 65 
I walk the Cliff, in earlier days oft trod . .100 

I was young and ' Harry ' was strong . . . 119 

Just on the threshold of threescore-and-ten . 103 

Many things in life there are 49 

'Mid the sunny flat of the cotton-field . . . 123 

Not always on the mount may we ... . 45 

Not in our waking hours alone 101 

Not to the lanes of England 104 

* Beautiful, my Country ! ' 131 

Heart of all the shining day 33 

Name, all other names above 31 

One moment on the scaffold, and he left it 

Holy Ground 129 

One step from the busy street, and there . . 126 

One thought I have, my ample creed ... 9 

Only ten miles from the city 77 

thou, in all thy might so far 13 

thou who art of all that is 41 

Praise to God and thanksgiving 67 

Routine of duties . 72 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 



135 



Shelf over shelf the mountain rose 
Something short in the making . 
Somewhere in the world there hi<le 
Still the angels sing on high . . 



The April thrills along the hills . . 
The church -hells for service are ringing 
The Lord is in his Holy Place . . . 
The rose is queen among the flowers 
Think what a price to pay .... 
To-day be joy in every heart . . . 
'T was Schliemann back from Troy . 
Twice have I turned to hear a tone . 

We pray no more, made lowly wise . 

What does it take 

When courage fails, and faith burns low 
When the night is still and far 
Where did yesterday's sunset go . . 
Who does not feel how weak . . 



Page 

80 

115 

107 

55 

117 
57 
17 
53 

113 
63 

110 
91 

27 
87 
47 
21 
89 
43 



THE 

THOUGHT OF GOD 

IN 

HYMNS AND POEMS 
E]}Xtz ^erteg in ©ne 

FREDERICK L. HOSMER 

AND 

WILLIAM C. GANNETT 

^econti Series 



BOSTON 

THE BEACON PRESS 

1918 



Copyright, i8g4, igrS 

BV FREDERICK L. HOSMER AND 
WILLIAM C. GANNETT 



Stanbope press 

F. H. GILSON COMPANY 
BOSTON, U. S. A. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

One Law, One Life, One Love . . . F. L. H. . , 9 
'Who Wert and Art and Evermore 

Shalt Be ' W. C. G. . . 11 

In Lonely Vigil F. L. H. . . 13 

Edelweiss : Translation " . . 14 

Edelweiss ... " . . 15 

The Crowning Day W. C. G. . . 16 

The Day of God F. L. H. . . 18 

The Inward Witness " . . 20 

Thou who art Strong to Heal ... " . . 22 

The Heavenly Helper «« . . 24 

Church-Bells W. C. G. . . 26 

Sun-Gleams « 29 

The Grace of God F. L. H. , . 30 

I» I^i^les W. C. G. . . 31 

With Self Dissatisfied F. L. H. . . 33 

Behind and Before ...... «< 35 

' Think on These Things ' t« . . 38 

The Cross on the Flag «« . . 40 



VI CONTENTS 

PAGE 

From Generation to Generation . . F. L. H. . . 42 

Holy Places " . . 44 

The Building of the Temple . . . W. C. G. . . 46 

The Word of God " . . 48 

Unto Him All Live F. L. H. . . 50 

Easter Morn " . . 51 

Risen " . . 52 

What will the Violets be W. C. G. . . 54 

Over the Land in Glory F. L. H. . . 55 

Easter Festival " . . 57 

Discipleship ......... " . . 59 

The Man of Nazareth " . . 62 

Mary's Manger-Song W. C. G. . . 64 

Whittier F. L. H. . . 66 

Whittier W. C. G. . . 67 

'Nothing but a Poet ' " , . 68 

Rembrandt F. L. H. . . 70 

The Sower " . . 72 

John C. Learned " . . 75 

' Incarnate Cheer' W. C. G. . . 76 

Thirty Thousand " . . 77 

Golden Wedding " . . 79 

TwiUght " . . 82 

'Death as Friend' " . . 84 

A. L. G " . . 87 

Alma Mater F. L. H. . . 89 

The Village Meeting-House .... " . . 91 



CONTENTS 



Vll 



The Days W. C. G 

The Old Love-Song 

The Dear Togetherness ..... 

Hero by Brevet 

Nursery Logic 

How Little Jo Named the Baby . . F. L, 

In the Albula Pass 

Coronado Beach 

Dover W 

We See as we Are 

Tree-Surprise 

A Day in October F. L. H 



H. 



C. G. 



PAQB 

95 
97 
99 
101 
103 
106 
109 
111 
112 
114 
115 
117 



ONE LAW, ONE LIFE, ONE LOVE 

O Prophet souls of all the years. 

Bend o'er us from above ; 
Your far-off vision, toils and tears 

Now to fulfilment move ! 

From tropic clime and zones of frost 
They come, of every name, — 

This, this our day of Pentecost, 
The Spirit's tongue of flame ! 

The ancient barriers disappear : 
Down bow the mountains high ; 

The sea-divided shores draw near 
In world-wide unity. 



One Life together we confess, 
One all-indwelling Word, 

One holy Call to righteousness 
Within the silence heard : 



10 ONE LAW, ONE LIFE, ONE LOVE 

One Law that guides the shining spheres 
As on through space they roll, 

And speaks in flaming characters 
On Sinais of the soul : 



An ever-flowing sea, 
That holds within its vast embrace 
Time and eternity. 

World's Parliament of Reli^^ions 
Chicago, 1893 



*WHO WERT AND ART AND 
EVERMORE SHALT BE' 

Bring, O Morn, thy music! Bring, O 
Night, thy hushes I 
Oceans, laugh the rapture to the storm-winds 
coursing free 1 
Suns and stars are singing. Thou art our 
Creator, 
Who wert and art and evermore shalt 
bel 

Life and Death, thy creatures, praise thee, 
Mighty Giver ! 
Praise and prayer are rising in thy beast 
and bird and tree : 
Lo 1 they praise and vanish, vanish at thy 
bidding, — 
Who wert and art and evermore shalt 
bel 



12 'WHO WERT AND ART' 

Light us ! lead us ! love us I cry thy grop- 
ing nations, 
Pleading in the thousand tongues but nam- 
ing only thee, 
Weaving blindly out thy holy, happy pur- 
pose, — 
Who wert and art and evermore shalt 
be I 

Life nor Death can part us, O thou Love 
Eternal, 
Shepherd of the wandering star and souls 
that wayward flee ! 
Homeward draws the spirit to thy Spirit 
yearning, — 
Who wert and art and evermore shalt 
bel 

1893 



IN LONELY VIGIL 

O THOU in lonely vigil led 
To follow Truth's new-risen star 
Ere yet her morning skies are red, 
And vale and upland shadowed are, — 

Gird up thy loins and take thy road, 
Obedient to the vision be : 
Trust not in numbers ; God is God, 
And one with Him majority ! 

Soon pass the judgments of the hour, 
Forgotten are the scorn and blame ; 
The Word moves on, a gladdening power. 
And safe enshrines the prophet's fame. 

Now, as of old, in lowly plight 
The Christ of larger faith is born : 
The watching shepherds come by night, 
And then — the kings of earth at morn ! 

Emerson Commemoration, W. U. C, 1888 



EDELWEISS 

From the German of Hermann Lxngg 

On the rock and girt with ice, 
Neiglibor to the circling star, 

Bloomcst thou, dear edelweiss, 
From all other flowers afar; 

By their joyous spring unblest, 

Lonely on the rock's cold breast. 

Where the lightnings have their home, 
And the startled chamois listen, 

AVhere the plunging waters foam, 
Eagles reign, and glaciers glisten, — 

Death and terror everywhere, — 

Pure and glad thou bloomest there. 

So stands he in noble pain. 

Lone anear the arching heaven, 

Lonely proud, who worldly gain. 
Smiles and honors, all has given 

Freely as his freedom's price, — 

As thou bloomest, edelweiss 1 

1891 



EDELWEISS 

This edelweiss I wear was not first mine ; 

I had it cheaply in the little town 

Of one who from the mountains had come 

down; 
A meek-eyed man, rough-clad, with many a 

sign 
Of burning sun and of the tempest's frown. 
Now through the valley, with its corn and 

wine, 
His star-blooms badge the thronging tourists 

fine 
Whose feet his toilsome path have never 

known. 

O prophet souls, who with bruised feet have 

trod 
The heaven-lit heights and thence to us have 

brought 
Your wider vision, your high-hearted faith, 
Your hope for Man, your larger thought of 

God,— 
We wear your edelweiss ; Life's common lot 
Ever to your high service witnesseth ! 

Switzerland, 1888 



THE CROWNING DAY 

The morning hangs its signal 

Upon the mountain's crest, 

While all the sleeping valleys 

In silent darkness rest ; 
From peak to peak it flashes, 

It laughs along the sky- 
That the crowning day is coming by and by I 
Chorus: O, the crowning day is coming, 
Is coming by and by ! 
We can see the rose of morning, 

A glory in the sky. 
And that splendor on the hill-tops 

O'er all the land shall lie 
In the crowning day that 's coming 
by and by ! 

Above the generations 

The lonely prophets rise, — 
The Truth flings dawn and day-star 

Within their glowing eyes ; 



THE CROWNING DAY 17 

From heart to heart it brightens, 

It draweth ever nigh, 
Till it crowneth all men thinking, by and by 1 
Chorus : O, the crowning day is coming 1 

The soul hath lifted moments 

Above the drift of days, 
When life's great meaning breaketh 

In sunrise on our ways ; 
From hour to hour it haunts us. 

The vision draweth nigh. 
Till it crowneth living, dying, by and by 1 
Chorus : O, the crowning day is coming 1 

And in the sunrise standing, 

Our kindling hearts confess 
That ' no good thing is failure, 

No evil thing success ! ' 
From age to age it groweth. 

That radiant faith so high, 
And its crowning day is coming by and by 1 
Chorus : O, the crowning day is coming ! 

Music : ' Gospel Hymns,' No. 416. 1886 



THE DAY OF GOD 

Thy kingdom come, — on bended knee 

The passing ages pray ; 
And faithful souls have yearned to see 

On earth that kingdom's day. 

But the slow watches of the night 

Not less to God belong, 
And for the everlasting Right 

The silent stars are strong. 

And lo 1 already on the hills 

The flags of dawn appear ; 
Gird up your loins, ye prophet souls, 

Proclaim the day is near ! 

The day in whose clear-shining light 
All wrong shall stand revealed ; 

When justice shall be throned in might, 
And every hurt be healed : 



THE DAY OP GOD 19 

When knowledge hand in hand with peace 
Shall walk the earth abroad, — 

The day of perfect righteousness, 
The promised day of God! 

M. T. S., June 12, 1891 



THE INWARD WITNESS 

O Thou whose Spirit witness bears 

Within our spirits free 
That we thy children are and heirs 

Of thine eternity, — 

Here may this simple faith sublime 

O'er-arch us like the sky; 
Secure below the drift of time 

Its firm foundations lie. 

Our thought o'erflows each written scroll, 
Our creeds, they rise and fall ; 

The life of God within the soul 
Lives and outlasts them all. 

Here may that witness clearer grow 

Each waiting heart within, 
The way of filial duty show 

And glad obedience win. 



THE INWARD WITNESS 21 

Here be life's sorrows sanctified, 
Here truth her radiance pour ; 

While hope and faith and love abide, 
Forever more and more 1 

For T K , Omaha, 1891 



THOU WHO ART STRONG TO 
HEAL 

O Fount of Being's sea, 
Forever flowing free, 

The One in all, — 
Thou whom no eye e'er saw, 
Indwelling Love and Law, 
To thee we suppliant draw. 

On thee we call. 

Be consecrate to truth, 
In manhood as in youth. 

Our growing powers; 
That we may read thy thought 
Nature and Life inwrought. 
Thy perfect will be taught, 

And make it ours ! 

Thine image may we own 

In Man, creation's crown, 

These temples thine : 



THOU WHO ART STRONG 23 

Holy our calling be, 
From bonds of pain to free, 
And bring the liberty 
Of life divine 1 

Thy presence still abide 
Within these walls to guide, 

Inspire and bless ; 
Thou who art strong to heal, 
The Christ-like touch reveal. 
And in each spirit seal 

Thy tenderness I 

Rush Medical College, Chicago, 1891 



THE HEAVENLY HELPER 

Unto thee, abiding ever, 

Look I in my need, 
Strength of every good endeavor, 

Holy thought and deed 1 

Thou dost guide the stars of heaven, 

Heal the broken heart, 
Bring in turn the morn and even, — 

Law and Love thou art. 

Clouds and darkness are about thee. 
Just and sure thy throne, — 

Not a sparrow falls without thee, 
All to thee is known. 

Origin and end of being. 

All things in and through, — 

Light thou art of all my seeing, 
Power to will and do. 



THE HEAVENLY HELPER 25 

Through my life, whate'er betide me, 

Thou my trust shalt be ; 
Whom have I on earth beside thee, 

Whom in heaven but thee ? 



1886 



CHURCH-BELLS 

Over hills and valleys, 

Over prairies wide, 
Quiet call the church-bells 

To the altar-side. 
High in old cathedrals 

Chant the brazen lips, 
Down the leafy by-ways 

Airy pleading slips. 

In his toil the worker 

Pauses at the sound, — 
Heaven a little nearer, 

Earth a holier ground. 
At the sound the Sundays 

With low music fill, — 
Hark ! the lands are singing, 

Then with prayers are still. 

Softer than the church-bells 
With their mellow peal. 

Softer, sweeter calling, 
Mystic voices steal ; 



CHUKLM JtSELLb 21 

All the shadowy valleys 

Memory calls her own, 
All the spirit's hill-tops 

Listen for the tone. 



Every soul that listens 

Hears the secret chime, — 
Bells from quiet inlands 

Out of space or time; 
Mother-tones will stir them, 

Child-appeals will start, 
Hero-deeds will set them 

Rinsing in the heart. 



Matin calls of duty 

Wake us every day ; 
'Mid each happy labor 

Angelus says < Pray 1 * 
Every hour that passes 

Hath a vesper end, 
Breathing, ' One who sleeps not 

Is thy constant Friend.' 



28 CHURCH BELLS 

Every hope that wings us, 

Making eagle-free, 
Every shame that bows us, 

Every loyalty, 
Each new joy and laughter, 

Sorrows old that bide, — 
Are God's church-bells calling 

To an altar-side. 

1891 



SUN-GLEAMS 

As silent as the sun-gleam in the forest, 
As quiet as the shadow on the hill, 

Is the shining of the Spirit in our dimness, 
Is the falling of its calm upon our will. 

But subtler than the sun-lift in the leaf-bud, 
That thrills through all the forests, mak- 
ing May, 
And stronger than the strength that plants 
the mountains, 
Is that shining in the heart-lands, bringing 
day. 

AusABLE Ponds, 1889 



THE GRACE OF GOD 

^My grace is sufficient for thee ' 

'Mid my life's vicissitude, 
Seeming evil mixed with good ; 
'Mid its pleasure and its pain, 
Alternating loss and gain, — 
Be thou still my staff and rod, 
All-sustaining grace of God! 

Like a pilgrim here I pass, 
Darkly see as through a glass ; 
Little know I of the way. 
What shall be I cannot say, — 
Let thy light upon me shine, 
All-sufficient grace divine ! 

'Mid my ever-changing mood 
God who changeth not is good; 
And his word within I have, 
He will guard the life he gave, - 
Sing, my soul, along thy road, 
Happy in the grace of God. 



1877 



IN LITTLES 

A LITTLE House of Life, 
With many noises rife, 

Noises of joy and crime ; 
A little gate of birth 
Through which I slipped to Earth 

And found myself in Time. 

And there, not far before, 
Another little door, 

One day to swing so free I 
None pauses there to knock. 
No other hand tries lock, — 

It knows, and waits for me. 

From out what Silent Land 
I came, on Earth to stand 

And learn Hfe's little art, 
Is not in me to say : 
I know I did not stray, — 

Was setit ; to come, my part. 



32 IN LITTLES 

And down what Silent Shore 
Beyond yon Uttle door 

I pass, I cannot tell ; 
I know I shall not stray, 
Nor ever lose the way, — 

Am sent ; and all is well. 

1891 



WITH SELF DISSATISFIED 

Not when, with self dissatisfied, 

O Lord, I lowly lie. 
So much I need thy grace to guide, 

And thy reproving eye, — 

As when the sound of human praise 

Grows pleasant to my ear, 
And in its light my broken ways 

Fair and complete appear. 

By failure and defeat made wise, 

We come to know at length 
What strength within our weakness lies, 

What weakness in our strength : 

What inward peace is born of strife, 
What power, of being spent ; 

What wings unto our upward life 
Is noble discontent. 

3 



34 WITH SELF DISSATISFIED 

O Lord, we need thy shaming look 
That burns all low desire ; 

The discipline of thy rebuke 
Shall be refining fire ! 

1893 



BEHIND AND BEFORE 

*One thing I do; the things behind forget- 
ting 
And reaching forward to the things before, 
Unto the goal, the prize of God's high calHng, 
Onward I press,' — said that great soul of 
yore. 

And in the heart, like strains of martial 
music, 
Echo the words of courage, trust, and 
cheer, 
The while we stand, half hoping, half re- 
gretting, 
Between the coming and the parting year. 

Behind are joys, fond hopes that found ful- 
filment, 
Sweet fellowships, glad toil of hand and 
brain. 



36 BEHIND AND BEFORE 

Unanswered prayers, burdens of loss and 
sorrow, 
Faces that look no more in ours again. 

Before us lie the hills, sunlit with promise, 
Fairer fulfilments than the past could 
know, 
New growths of soul, new leadings of the 
Spirit, 
And all the glad surprises God will show. 

All we have done, or nobly failed in doing, 
All we have been, or bravely striven to be, 

Makes for our gain, within us still surviving 
As power and larger possibility. 

All, all shall count; the mingled joy and 
sorrow 

To force of finer being rise at last : 
From the crude ores in trial's furnace smelted 

The image of the perfect life is cast. 

* Onward 1 press, the things behind forget- 
ting 
And reaching forward to the things be- 
fore : ' 



BEHIND AND BEFORE 37 

Ring the brave words like strains of martial 
music 
As we pass through the New Year's 
opened door. 



< THINK ON THESE THINGS' 

' Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things 
are honorable, lohatsoever tilings are just, whatso 
ever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, 
whatsoever things are of good rcpnrt , if there be 
any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on 
these things.'' 

Whatsoever is just and pure, 

Think on these things, my soul ! 
Earth shall vanish, but these endure, 
Think on these things, my soul ! 
When all else shall fail thee. 
These shall still avail thee ; 
Think on these things, strive for these thmgs, 
Cherish these things, my soul ! 

Truth and honor, they call to thee. 
Think on these things, my soul ! 

What of virtue and praise there be, 
Think on these things, my soul ! 



THINK ON THESE THINGS 39 

These have been the glory 
Of all human story ; 
Think on these things, strive for these things, 
Cherish these things, my soul ! 

Faithful spirits before have gone, 

Think on these things, my soul I 
Grand thy heritage, hero-won. 
Think on these things, my soul \ 
From all brave endeavor 
Springeth good forever ; 
Think on these things, strive for these things, 
Cherish these things, my soul 1 

Music: 'Gospel Hymns,' No. 282 



THE CROSS ON THE FLAG 



From age to age they gather, all the brave 

of heart and strong, 
In the strife of truth with error, of the right 

against the wrong ; 
I can see their gleaming banner, I can hear 

their triumph-song ; 

The Truth is marching: on ! 



* In this sign we conquer ; ' 't is the symbol 

of our faith, 
Made holy by the might of love triumphant 

over death ; 
He finds his life who loseth it, forevermore 

it saith : 

The Right is marching on ! 

The earth is circling onward out of shadow 
into light ; 

The stars keep watch above our way, how- 
ever dark the night ; 



THE CROSS ON THE FLAG 41 

For every martyr's stripe there glows a bar 
of morning bright : 

And Love is marching on ! 

Lead on, O cross of martyr-faith, with thee 

is victory ! 
Shine forth, O stars and reddening dawn, 

the full day yet shall be ! 
On earth his kingdom cometh, and with joy 

our eyes shall see : 

Our God is marching on ! 

For S. S. H., Decorah, Ia., 1891 



FKOM GENERATION^ TO GENERA- 
TION 

O Light, from age to age the same, 

Forever living Word, — 
Here have we felt thy kindling flame, 

Thy voice within have heard. 

Here holy thought and hymn and prayer 
Have winged the spirit's powers. 

And made these walls divinely fair, — 
Thy temple, Lord, and ours. 

What visions rise above the years, 
What tender memories throng, 

Till the eye fills with happy tears. 
The heart with grateful song ! 

Vanish the mists of time and sense ; 

They come, the loved of yore, 
And one encircling Providence 

Holds all for evermore. 



PROM GENERATION, ETC. 43 

O, not in vain their toil who wrought 
To build faith's freer shrine, — 

Nor theirs whose steadfast love and thought 
Have watched the fire divine. 

Burn, holy fire, and shine more wide I 

While systems rise and fall, 
Faith, hope, and charity abide, 

The heart and soul of all. 

QuiNCY, III. : Fiftieth Anniversary, 1890 



HOLY PLACES 

Where men on mounts of vision 

Have passed the veil within, 
Where hearts bowed in contrition 

Have risen from their sin, 
Where light on upturned faces 

Earth's Calvaries has crowned, - 
Here are her holy places, 

This, consecrated ground. 

Wliere life is nobly given 

And man for man has died, 
Where bonds of wrong are riven 

And right is glorified, — 
One faith the spirit traces, 

Brightening from age to age ; 
These are earth's holy places 

And shrines of pilgrimage. 



HOLY PLACES 45 

Here, Lord, may thy revealing 

In waiting hearts be known, 
Here hoUer thought and feehns 

The secret Presence own : 
May prayer and aspiration, 

In-shinings of thy grace, 
And sorrow's consolation 

Make this our holy place 1 

Still from the spirit's essence 

All things new meaning win; 
The temple of thy presence 

Is ever, Lord, within. 
May outward dedication 

Have inward seal and sign. 
The spirit's consecration 

Make beautiful the shrine I 

For C. W. W., Oakland, Cal., 1891 



THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE 

THE CORNER-STONE 

He laid his rocks in courses, 

His forest crowned the hill, 
He yoked the ancient forces 

And lent them to our will ; 
The heart he woke to duty. 

He graced the builder's thought, — 
He gave Creation beauty. 

And he the Temple wrought ! 

Now, Father, build within us 

The Temple's counterpart, 
Deep laid in holy purpose, 

Fair colored of the heart ; 
Its windows heaven-lighted, 

Peace and Good-will its plan, 
Its towers our Faith and Worship, 

Its doors the Love of Man 1 

1888 



BUILDING OP THE TEMPLE 47 



THE DEDICATION 

To cloisters of the spirit 

These aisles of quiet lead : 
Here may the vision gladden, 

The voice within us plead 1 
And may the dear All-Father, 

Who maketh trouble cease, 
Here send his two, the blessed, 

His angels Shame and Peace I 



Here be no man a stranger ; 

No holy cause be banned ; 
No good for one be counted 

Not good for all the land ! 
And here for prophet voices 

The message never fail, — 
' God reigns ! His Truth shall conquer. 

And Right and Love prevaill ' 

1894 



THE WORD OF GOD 

It sounds along the ages, 

Soul answering to soul ; 
It kindles on the pages 

Of every Bible scroll ; 
The psalmists heard and sang it, 

From martyr-lips it broke. 
And prophet-tongues outrang it 

Till sleeping nations woke. 

From Sinai's cliffs it echoed, 

It breathed from Buddha's tree, 
It charmed in Athens' market. 

It gladdened Galilee ; 
The hammer-stroke of Luther, 

The Pilgrims' sea-side prayer, 
The oracles of Concord, 

One holy Word declare. 



THE WORD OF GOD 49 

It dates each new ideal, — 

Itself it knows not time ; 
Man's laws but catch the music 

Of its eternal chime. 
It calls — and lo, new Justice ! 

It speaks — and lo, new Truth ! 
In ever nobler stature 

And unexhausted youth. 

It everywhere arriveth ; 

Recks not of small and great ; 
It shapes the unborn atom, 

It tells the sun its fate. 
The wing-beat of archangel 

Its boundary never ncars : 
Forever on it soundeth 

The music of the spheres I 

1894 



UNTO HIM ALL LIVE 

O Lord of Life, where'er they be, 
Safe in thine own eternity, 
Our dead are living unto thee. 

All souls are thine and, here or there, 
They rest within thy sheltering care ; 
One providence alike they share. 

Thy word is true, thy ways are just ; 
Above the requiem * dust to dust ' 
Shall rise our psalm of grateful trust. 

O happy they in God who rest, 

No more by fear and doubt oppressed ; 

Living or dying they are blest. 

Alleluia ! 



EASTER MORN 

On eyes that watch through sorrow's night, 

On aching hearts and worn, 
Rise thou with heaHng in thy Hght, 

O happy Easter morn ! 

The dead earth wakes beneath thy rays, 

The tender grasses spring ; 
The woods put on their robes of praise. 

And flowers are blossoming. 

O shine within the spirit's skies, 

Till, in thy kindling glow, 
From out the buried memories 

Immortal hopes shall grow : 

Till from the seed oft sown in grief, 

And wet with bitter tears, 
Our faith shall bind the harvest sheaf 

Of the eternal years 1 

1890 



RISEN 

They came, bringing spices, at break of the 

day 

With hearts heavy-laden and sore, 

And, lo, from the tomb was the stone rolled 
away, 

An angel sat there by the door 1 

*Why seek ye the hving 'mid emblems of 

death ? 

Not here, he is risen/ the shining one saith. 

O type through the ages and symbol of faith. 

Whose spirit is true evermore : 
The hearts we have cherished we lose not in 
death, 
The grave over love hath no power. 
There sitteth the angel, there speaketh the 

word, — 
* Not here, they are risen,' in silence is 
heard. 



RISEN 53 

O ye who still watcli in the valley of tears 

And wait for the night to go by, 
Lift, lift up your eyes, on the mountains 
appears 
The day-spring of God from on high 1 
He turneth the shadows of night into day, — 
*Not here, they are risen,' his shining ones 
say. 

Santa Barbara, 1894 



WHAT WILL THE VIOLETS BE? 
S. A. M. 

What will the violets be 

There in the Spring of springs ? 
What will the bird-song be 

Where the very tree-bough sings? 
What will their Easter be 

Where never are dead to mourn, 
But brightly the faces ask, 

' O, when will the rest be born ? ' 

Brighter the Easter shines 

On the faces here below, 
That they are behind the flowers, 

The heart of the living glow. 
Beautiful secret, wait ! 

A morrow or two, and we 
Shall know in the Spring of springs 

What the violets will be. 
1886 



OVER THE LAND IN GLORY 

Over the land in glory 

Breaketh the Easter morn : 
Nature repeateth her story, — 

Life out of death new-born ! 
Lo, the year 's at the Spring, 

Buds are blossoming, 
Earth and heavens sing : 

Life is life forever, evermore ! 

Listen, the birds are singing, 

Softly the south winds play ; 
Bells in the steeples ringing 

Welcome the festal day : 
And the message they bear 

On the radiant air 

Chides sorrow and fear : 

Life is life forever, evermore 1 



56 OVER THE LAND IN GLORY 

Skies of the spirit brighten, 

Hopes like the birds return : 
Hearts with the promise lighten, — 

' Blessed are they that mourn.' 
To each winter a Spring 

God will surely bring, 

And the heart shall sing : 

Life is life forever, evermore ! 

Music : ' King's-Chapel Carols,' No. 49. 1890 



EASTER FESTIVAL 

Lo, the Day of days is here, 
Earth puts on her robes of cheer : 
Day of hope and prophecy, 
Feast of Immortality ! 
Fields are smiling in the sun, 
Loosened streamlets seaward run, 
Tender blade and leaf appear, 
'T is the Springtide of the year ! 
Day of hope and prophecy, 
Feast of Immortality I 

Lo, the Day of days is here. 
Hearts, awake and sing with cheer ! 
lie who robes his earth anew 
Careth for his children too. 
They who look to him in faith 
Triumph over fear and death ; 
Speaks the angel by the door 
' They are risen ' evermore. 



58 EASTER FESTIVAL 

Day of hope and prophecy, 
Feast of Immortality ! 

Lo, the Day of days is here, 
Music thrills the atmosphere. 
Join, ye people all, and sing 
Love and praise and thanksgiving ! 
Rocky steep or flowery mead, 
One the Shepherd that doth lead ; 
One the hope within us born, 
One the joy of Easter morn ! 
Day of hope and prophecy, 
Feast of Immortality ! 

Music : * King's-Chapel Carols,' No. 4. 1890 



DISCIPLESHIP 

On the Judsean hills 

Would 1 have seen the light 
The watching shepherds saw, 

Turning to noon the night V 
Would I have seen the star 

That new in heaven shone, 
And followed with the few 

The new-born Christ to own? 

And if mine ears had heard 

The Man of Galilee 
Speaking from heart aflame 

The Truth that maketh free, 
Turning from priest and scribe, 

Dead rite and parchment roll. 
Would 1 have hailed in him 

A Prophet of the Soul ? 



60 DISCIPLESHIP 

Those words upon the mount, 

By way-sides, in the town, — 
Unwelcome to his time, 

Now Holy Scripture grown, — 
Would I have read in them 

A message from on high, 
Or joined the multitude 

Who cried out Crucify f 

Ah, vain for you or me 

To question thus the Past ! 
Not then but now for us 

The fateful choice is cast ; 
Ever the larger faith 

Makes way 'mid doubt and scorn, 
And in its latest word 

Anew the Christ is born. 

The true disciples they, 

The wide earth o'er, who own 
Truth in her manger low, 

Ere yet she mounts the throne : 
Who from the dead Christ's tomb 

Take not the stones to slay 
In blinded fear and rage 

Thp living Christ to-day. 



DISCIPLESHIP 61 

They hear the angels' song, 

'T is they who see the light 
The watching shepherds saw 

Making the heavens bright : 
They see the self-same star 

O'er Bethlehem that shone, 
And follow joyful forth 

The new-born Christ to own. 



1888 



JESUS WHO? 

Ah, no, but thought too awful grows 
For name or speech or look : 

In silent floods the secret pours 
That babbled in the brook. 



1871 



CHRISTMAS 

To-day be joy in every heart, 

For lo, the angel throng 
Once more above the listening earth 

Repeats the advent song ; 

* Peace on the earth, good- will to men ! * 

Before us goes the star 
That leads us on to holier births 

And life diviner far ! 

Ye men of strife, forget to-day 
Your harshness and your hate ; 

Too long ye stay the promised years 
For which the nations wait ! 

And ye upon the tented field, 

Sheathe, sheathe to-day the sword ! 

By love, and not by might, shall come 
The kin^'dom of the Lord. 



MARY'S MANGEll-SONG 

Sleep, my little Jesus, 

On thy bed of hay, 
While the shepherds homeward 

Journey on their way ! 
Mother is thy shepherd 

And will vigil keep : 
O, did the angels wake thee ? 

Sleep, my Jesus, sleep ! 

Sleep, my little Jesus, 

While thou art my own ! 
Ox and ass thy neighbors, — 

Shalt thou have a throne ? 
Will they call me blessed ? 

Shall I stand and weep ? 
O, be it far, Jehovah ! 

Sleep, my Jesus, sleep 1 



MARY'S MANGER-SONG 65 

Sleep, my little Jesus, 

Wonder-baby mine 1 
Well the singing angels 

Greet thee as divine. 
Through my heart, as heaven, 

Low the echoes sweep 
Of Glory to Jehovah ! 

Sleep, my Jesus, sleep 1 

Music : ' The Carol,' page 44. 1882 



WHITTIER 

No thrush at eve had ever sweeter song 
Than thine whose voice no more on earth 

we hear ; 
Nor winds and flowing streams more please 

the ear, 
Nor to the speech of Nature more belong. 
And yet thy heart beat ever with the throng 
Of toil ; the lowliest life thou didst revere 
And the wide law of brotherhood hold dear, 
Most mindful still of all who suffered wrong. 

Best loved of all the choir we loved so well, 
'T was thine to bring again the Master near, 
And hymn to men the Goodness without end : 
Psalmist we call thee of our Israel, 
Child of the Spirit, poet, prophet, seer, — 
And to us all, of every name, the Friend / 

1892 



WHITTIER 

A RUGGED rock is the mountain, 

Rock from the base to crown ; 
But the mountain glens and valleys, 

Where the brooks come leaping down, 
Are gardens of tender, f^rny things. 

Sweet tangles of green and brown. 

Like the mountain stood our poet ! 

Strength of the hills was he. 
In the quiet sky uplifted, 

A moveless sanctity ; 
And the listening lands heard thunders roll 

Of his Sinai prophecy. 

But the brooks in his heart were singing, 

Singing all night and day. 
And rhymes like the mosses nestled 

Over the ledges gray. 
And a poet's radiant world of flowers 

Out-bloomed from the Yea and Nay. 

1892 



'NOTHING BUT A POET' 

* He sat and talked of his oum early life and 
aspirations; how he marvelled, as he looked back, 
at the audacious obstinacy which had made him, 
when a youth, determine to be a poet and noth- 
ing but a poet.' — Edmumd Gosse on Robert 
Browning. 

' Nothing but a poet ! ' So he said, and 
wondered 
At the sole persistence of his years. 
Laughing world, you '11 know it, now that, 
silence-sundered, 
He is in the welcome of his peers. 

What said Milton to him, what said Keats 
and Shakespeare ? 
O, to see the smile on Dante's face 1 
Catch the great Greek xat/>f ^ hear the ' bronze 
throat ' hail him, 
' Browning 's come among us, — give him 
place 1 ' 



'NOTHING BUT A POET' 69 

'Nothing but a poet,' singing songs of soul- 
growth, 

Splendor in the pain-throb, rise in fall, 
' Saul the failure ' in us re-creating kingly, 

Songs one surge of morning ! That was all ! 

Browning Commemoration, 1890 



REMBRANDT 

Suggested by the portrait of his mother in the 
Hermitage, St. Petersburg. 

Gazing upon that face where years have 

wrought 
The record of their mingled loss and gain, 
Where Love and Death, alternate joy and 

pain. 
Have the hid soul to such expression 

brought, — 
Life fills with vaster meaning to my thought. 
*Neath change and loss I read what things 

remain 
To crown at last the struggle and the strain 
Of all our days, remembered or forgot. 

O mighty Master ! Shakespeare of the brush ! 
Interpreting to eye, as he to ear, 



REMBRANDT 71 

The story of earth's passion and its strife, — 
Thy genius caught the new day's morning 

flush, 
Saw glory in the common and the near, 
And on immortal canvas gave us life 1 

1892 



THE SOAVER 

^A sower went forth to sow.* 

Along the pathless prairie 

The tread of human feet, — 
Up rise the smoke-plumed cabins 

'Mid springing corn and wheat. 
Where, like a lonely ocean, 

The wind-swept grasses swung, 
The golden sheaves are gathered, 

The harvest song is sung. 

In vigil of the spirit 

A young-eyed listener heard, — 
* Go forth among thy fellows, 

Thy seed the living Word ! 
By springs of joy and sorrow, 

In fields of toil and care. 
Through deserts of temptation. 

Broadcast thy faith and prayer.' 



THE SOWER 73 

From year to year the prairie 

Has waved with ripened grain, 
Borne on the tides of traffic 

Wide over land and main. 
But who shall mart the harvest 

Of nobler thought and deed, 
Of holier faith and purpose, 

Sprung from the sower's seed ? 



O brave and faithful sower, 

N'ot thine on earth to bind 
The full sheaves of thy harvest, 

The growths of heart and mind 
Outspreads in widening circles 

The life-embodied Word, 
And they shall bear thee witness 

Thy voice who never heard. 



The people cease from labor. 
The children leave their play ; 

All bring thee love and honor 
To crown thy festal day. 



74 THE SOWER 

The heavens glow in beauty 
Lit by the westering sun, 

And God's far stars shall guide thee 
When the long day is done. 

Chester Covel, Seventieth birthday, 1887 



JOHN C. LEARNED 

Thy work abides, though thou hast passed 

from sight : 
Unconsciously hast thou thy monument 
From year to year built fair and permanent 
In lives to which thine own was cheer and 

light. 
Wisdom and meekness clothed thee with 

their might ; 
In thee the sage and saint were equal blent; 
Strength, courage, tenderness dwelt in thy 

tent, 
Thou soldier of the everlasting Right ! 

By so much as we mourn thee, we rejoice 
That we have known thee in these earthly 

ways. 
And with thee striven for the things unseen : 
Still in our silences will speak thy voice 
And thy dear memory inspire our days. 
Till we too pass the veil that hangs between. 

December, 1893 



* INCARNATE CHEER' 

^Haven't I a right to be grave, too, sometimes?' 
J. LI. J. 

No rights of gravity to thee, dear friend ! 
We need one face about our world to mend 
Heart's hurt and set jarred minds in tune, 
And sure to do this as the blessed June ; 
One voice whose bell shall ring away all 

fear ; 
One hand in which we grasp ' incarnate 

cheer ; ' 
One steadfast smile rayed out from eyes 

alight, 
To make men say, ' He 's come ! now all is 

right I * 

To J. LI. J. on his birthday, 1887 



THIRTY THOUSAND 

' Thirty thousand ! * said the Fate, 

Mixer of the days to be, 
As she passed the mystic gate, — 

Little Quaker baby, she ! 

Thirty thousand days and nights — 
This the dower with which she came 

All their sounds and all their sights 
Vested in the tiny dame. 

' Thirty thousand,' said the Fate ; 

But who draw the royal breath 
Into deeds the days translate. 

Dainty Queen Elizabeth ! 

Price is high for royal dowers ; 

Thee must earn thy golden state I 
Spendthrift gods fling out the hours, 

Miser gods keep count and weight. 



78 THIRTY THOUSAND 

Day and night and night and day, 
One by one the thousands flee : 

Lady of the Yea and Nay, 

Thou lia&t earned thy queenerie ! 

Earned it as a noble should. 

Dauntless, tireless, gentle-strong ; 

Giving Yea to every good, 
Daring Nay to every wrong. 

Not in calendars thy fame, 
But secrete in happy prayer ; 

Lips have blessed thee — not by name 
Thanking God for ' daily care.' 

Thou dost leave a sweeter earth, 
Less of poison, less of fen, 

By thy precedent of worth 

Stablished in the world's Amen. 

Thou art part of all uplift ! 

One tint brighter rises morn 
Henceforth ever, — this thy gift 

Wheresoe'er a child is born. 

To E. B. C, on her eightieth birthday, 1886 



GOLDEN WEDDING 

What do you see, dear hill-top pair, 
Side by side in the quiet there, 
Looking down through the golden air 
On the days of long ago ? 



'o' 



Sounds of the valley's push and thron<^ 

Din of its labor and cries of its wrong, 

Do they rise and blend to an evening song, 
As you stand and hsten so ? 

Is the valley filling with shadows dim? 
Do the hills grow bright on the eastern rim, 
The hills where you played so free of limb, 
In the days of long ago ? 

Tell us your secrets, our two-in-one 1 
Do fifty years of the rising sun 
Draw love the closer for each year run, — 
Will you whisper, yon who know ? 



80 GOLDEN WEDDING 

Beautiful secrets that none can tell 
Till sunsets chant and the roses spell, — 
As they do for twos ! as two knew well 
In the days of long ago. 

But say, O lover by love long taught, 
Why, under the gray the years have brought, 
She stands as a maiden to our thought, 
And a rose that waits to blow. 

Tell us the secret of home-spun ways. 
Of spinning-wheel hours in city days, 
Clean and calm as a Quaker j)hrase 
Of the simple long ago. 

Tell what you see on the farther side. 
Where the new horizons open wide. 
And you hear the step of a coming Guide 
The way of the hills to show. 

Out of the quiet that holds you there 
There seems to float through the golden air, 
Like the brooding music after prayer 
Or a song of long ago : — 



GOLDEN WEDDING 81 

* Little we see ; but hand in hand 
Fearless we turn to the still, new land, 
Fearless to go as here to stand ; 
For this in our hearts we know, — 

' Wherever we go, Love goeth too ; 
Whatever may pass, Love lasteth through; 
And Love shall be sweet and dear and true 
As in days of long ago.' 

For J. D. and M. D. : 1836-1886 



TWILIGHT 

The sunset glow is ebbing ; 

Within the rose-rimnied sky 
The stars wait wide and lonely 

The slow day's passing by. 

The evening dusks the valleys ; 

The hill-tops yet are lit ; 
The shadow broadens upward, 

And the quiet climbs with it. 

All that the day dissevers 
Now, in the twilight dun, 

Nestles again together, — 
The far and the near are one. 



Within her cloistered chamber 
Brooded the evening peace, 

As the dear life faded slowly, 
Too happy to wish release. 



TWILIGHT 83 

In the widening hush she waited, 

In the beautiful after-glow, 
The hills of her memory gleaming. 

The shadows climbing below. 

The holy twilight falling 

Was not of the star and sun ; 
The earth and the heaven lights mingled, — 

And the far and near were one. 

0. M. N., 1894 



< DEATH AS FRIEND' 

After a picture by Alfred Bethel 

So still ! 
The little bird sits on the window-sill ; 
The sun behind him is sinking slow ; 
Down below in the city streets 
The people are going to and fro, — 

Going home, for their work is done. 

' Tong ! Tong ! ' 
It is vesper-hour, 
And soft strong booms 
Steal out from the great cathedral tower 
Over the house-tops, over the plain, 
Out towards the sun : 
' Tong ! Tong ! 
Go home, for work is done ! ' 

The old bell-ringer. 
He, too, is so still I 
Fifty years, at the vesper hour, 
He has rung the bell in his eyrie tower ; 



♦ DEA TH AS FRIEND ' 85 

A dweller there with the birds in the sky, 
In the fields of quiet that overlie 
The toil of cities, — ringing ' Peace ! 
Go home, for work is done ! ' 

There, alone, 

AVhere the undertone 
Of the city toil moans up to him, 
He has done his part in the busy day, 
Ringing the pauses for men to pray, — 
Simply, faithfully, fifty years ; 
Ever, in heart, at his oaken board 
Breaking his bread with the crucified Lord, 

In whose great name 

The bells proclaim 
* Peace ! go home, for work is done ! ' 

One by one 
The strokes sound on. 
He sits in the chair by the window-sill : 
The little bird wonders at him so still. 
So still in the fingers, so still in the face ! 
' What ails the ringer?' the people say, 
' The vesper-bell rings long to-day : 
We have all gone home, 
And work is done.' 



86 'DEATH AS FRIEND' 

Low, low, 

In the evening glow, 
It tolls and tolls. 
In the belfry stands a hooded shape, 
With a palmer's shell on his shoulder-cape. 
As one who goeth from place to place : 
He grasps the rope with a bony hand. 
Bending with a tender grace 
To each rhythm of sweeping sound. 
With a noiseless foot he has climbed the stair, 
And touched the old man sitting there, 
Waiting for the vesper-hour, and said, 
* To-night I ring for you, old friend : 
Go home, for work is done ! ' 

So still ! 
The little bird flies from the window-sill. 
The sun has set, and down below 
The people are saying, ' It never rang so, 

Never before, so sweet and low ! ' 
' R. LI. J., 1885 



A. L. G. 

1846 

So early lost, I cannot tell the lift 

Of mother-arms ! A toy or two, her gift ; 

A small white gown, her needle in its seam; 

And, dim as is a dream within a dream, 

A little figure at a shadow's feet, 

Or walking hand in hand upon the street, — 

A gentle shadow with an unseen face, — 

No smile, no tone, no foot-fall mine for trace ; 

That is my unknown Mother I 

Yet I know 
The inmost currents of my beino- flow 
From her high springs ; the faiths that in me 

rise 
Have once made happy lights within her 

eyes; 



88 A. L. G. 

The gardens of my heart are seeded thick 
With border-blooms that first in hers were 

quick ; 
My very thought of God is her bequest, 
Sealed mine before I lay upon her breast ! 

O Mother, could an earthly smile suffice, 
And these not serve me well to recognize ? 
Inwrought and deathless tokens pledge us 

joy 

What day my Mother meets her grateful 
boy! 

1894 



ALMA MATER 

From many ways and wide apart, 

Obedient to thy call, 
Hither we turn with loyal heart. 

Dear Mother of us all ! 

We walk the well-known paths once more 

Amid the summer's bloom ; 
We pass familiar thresholds o'er, 

And breathe the air of home. 

Nor we alone ; they come unseen. 

Unheard their footsteps fall ; 
Voices long hushed to earth within 

The cloistered silence call. 

O, more than gold has been the lore 
We learned beside thy knee, — 

The faith that grows from more to more, 
The truth that maketh free ; 



90 ALMA MATER 

The strength to do and to endure 
Through good report and ill, 

The heart of love, the conscience pure, 
And the undaunted will. 

Be proud, O Mother, of thy past ! 

It lives in thee to-day ; 
And still its high traditions cast 

Their Hght upon thy way. 

Our love and hope ring out their chime 

Above thy festival ; 
Blessings upon thee through all time, 

Thou who hast blessed us all 1 

1890 



THE VILLAGE MEETING-HOUSE 

Still stands the ancient meeting-house 

Upon the village-green, 
And white above the circling trees 

The belfry tower is seen. 

Uncolored through the simple panes 
The common sunlight pours ; 

No Gothic arches spring above 
The latched and painted doors. 

Their thresholds witness to the tread 

Of feet long since at rest 
In yonder field of moss-grown slates 

With Bible-text impressed. 

No more at rise and set of sun 

Is heard the numbered toll 
That spoke to all the country round 

The passing of a soul : 



92 VILLAGE MEETING-HOUSE 

Yet still with every new-born week, 

Across the meadows fair 
And over all the upland farms, 

Sounds the old call to prayer. 

I walked again the village street 
By absence made more dear ; 

That summer Sunday held the bloom 
And fragrance of the year. 

I followed with the worshippers 
The ancient house within ; 

For me with all I saw and heard 
Was mingled what had been. 

For memory had new-kindled love, 
And love had quickened faith ; 

I lived ihat hour within a world 
That knew not change and death. 

I minded not the preacher's theme, 
Nor caught the words of prayer ; 

My thought had passed within the veil 
And walked with spirits there. 



VILLAGE MEETING-HOUSE 93 

The faithful shepherd of the flock, 
Whose years knew such increase, 

Who led in wisdom's simple ways 
And by the streams of peace ; 

The wise and upright citizen, 

To each good cause allied, 
Who brightened more an honored name 

Through all the country-side ; 

And souls that well had borne their part, 

And little children fair ; — 
Their unforgotten faces gleamed 

In the illumined air. 

I love the minster's vaulted roof, 

Its walls of old renown, 
Where sculptured marbles voice the past 

And windowed saints look down : 

Nor less I feel our Hebrew strain. 

Distrustful still of art, 
That lifts to the Invisible 

Immediate the heart. 



94 VILLAGE MEETING-HOUSE 

For inward more than outward is, 
The soul than any shrine ; 

Alone our living love and trust 
The altar make divine. 

Long may the ancient meeting-house 
Rise from the village-green, 

And over all the country round 
Its belf ried tower be seen : 

Still may the call to praise and prayer 
Be heard each Sunday morn, 

And bind in growing faith the past 
With ages yet unborn ! 

NORTHBOROUGH, MaSS. 



THE DAYS 

In Father Time's old nursery 

The little Morrows wait, 
Each one impatient to be out, 

Impatient to be great ; 
On bravely through the sun to go, 

On bravely through the showers, 
A world to see, a Day to be ! 

The happy-hearted Hours 1 

So one by one he lets them out, 

His Days so young and strong. 
The morning shining in their face, 

And on their lips a song. 
When home they come, their work all done. 

There 's quiet in their ways, 
And shadows rise and haunt their eyes, — 

They 're dear old Yesterdays I 



96 THE DAYS 

And now we love them for the half 

Of all that we hold dear, — 
The echo- side of every word, 

The far to every near ; 
The sunset touch to every hope 

That fades along our skies, 
The after-dream, the vanished gleam, 

The love in long-shut eyes. 

Rochester : 'Fiftieth Anniversary,' 1892 



THE OLD LOVE-SONG 

Play it slowly, sing it lowly, 

Old, familiar tune ! 
Once it ran in dance and dimple, 

Like a brook in June; 
Now it sobs along the measures 

With a sound of tears ; 
Dear old voices echo through it, 

Vanished with the years. 

Ripple, ripple, goes the love-song, 

Till in slowing time 
Early sweetness grows completeness, 

Floods its every rhyme. 
Who together learn the music 

Life and death unfold, 
Know that love is but beginning 

Until love is old. 
7 



98 THE OLD LOVE-SONG 

Play it slowly, — it is holy 

As an evening hymn ; 
Morning gladness hushed to sadness 

Fills it to the brim. 
Memories home within the music, 

Stealing through the bars ; 
Thoughts within its quiet spaces 

Rise and set like stars. 

For J. W. C. and A. H. C. : 1865-1890 



THE DEAR TOGETHERNESS 

I DREAMED of Paradise, — and still, 
Though sun lay soft on vale and hill 
And trees were green and rivers bright, 
The one dear thing that made delio-ht 
By sun or stars or Eden weather, 
Was just that we two were together. 

I dreamed of Heaven, — with God so near ! 
Tlie angels trod the shining sphere, 
And each was beautiful ; the days 
Were choral work, were choral praise : 
And yet in Heaven's far-shining weather 
The best was still, — we were together ! 

I woke, — and lo, my dream was true. 
That happy dream of me and you ! 

For Eden, Heaven, no need to roam, 

The foretaste of it all is Home, 

Where you and I through this world's 
weather 

Still work and praise and thank together. 



100 THE DEAR TOGETHERNESS 

Together weave from love a nest 

For all that 's good and sweet and blest 

To brood in, till it come a face, 

A voice, a soul, a child's embrace, — 

And then what peace of Bethlehem wea- 
ther, 

What songs as we go on together ! 

Together greet life's solemn real, 

Together own one glad ideal, 

Together laugh, together ache. 

And think one thought, ' each other's sake,' 

And hope one hope, — in new-world wea- 
ther 

To still go on, and go together ! 

Home Dedication, 1891 



HERO BY BREVET 

I SAW a veteran to-day, 

With hobbling foot and staff to stay, 

In slow march by the window stray. 

' What rank ? ' There was no epaulet, — 
Some humble rank that privates get: 
The face said, Hero by brevet, 

* What regiment ? ' I only know 
They take the front where'er they go, 
As that were badge enough to show. 

* No colors ? ' None that I could see, — 
A few gray locks were waving free. 
Like shot-torn banners greeting me. 

' In service where ? ' How could I guess ? 
No boast of battles marred the dress. 
But eyes were full of field-success. 



102 HERO BY BREVET 

* No scars or maim, no empty sleeve ? ' 
Only the smile that sufferings leave 
And weary days and nights achieve. 

* And all alone, — no comrade-brother ? ' 
Alone, yet loved beyond all other. 

' By whom ? ' By men who call her 
Mother 1 

1886 



NURSERY LOGIC 

There in tl\e nursery stood the case, 
Old and battered and brown with age, — 

Dear Aunt Ann's with the saintly face, — 
Till one of our toddlers, in cherubic racre, 

Chanced on a spring and a drawer flew wide. 

And lo, a plain gold ring inside ! 

Wee Aunt Ann with the mystic smile. 
That was the secret thy eyes held fast ! 

Did they learn their smile in the long-ago 
while 
When the wooers came and the wooers 



And not one dreamed that a drawer flew 

wide, 
A drawer with a plain gold ring inside ? 



104 NURSERY LOGIC 

Nobody guessed from then till now, 
Little maid-aunt, thy secret sweet ! 

Then nobody shall, but he and thou. 

Long in the heaven where old loves meet. 

But — knows he yet that a drawer flew wide 

To show his plain gold ring inside ? 

So we all agreed, the children and I, 
Dropping again the ring in its place, 

Never to spy what lives so shy 

There in the heart of the old brown case. 

But the children say, * If a drawer flew 
wide, — 

There 's a dear little uncle and aunt inside ! ' 



Who ? is his name. O, they know well, — 
Have christened him, wedded him now for 
true! 
But that is her secret, and they won't tell ; 

So it 's just ' Aunt Ann and Uncle Who ? ' 
And (bless their logic !) they hear, inside, 
Three little dream-cousins who laugh and 
hide. 



NURSERY LOGIC 105 

Cousins real to the poets small, 

Brooding the dream, as they themselves; 
Christened and charactered, each and all, 

Discrete, insular, untwinned elves ! 
Poets — or prophets ? Should heaven ope 

wide. 
Whose are the children at Aunt Ann's side ? 



HOW LITTLE JO NAMED THE 
BABY 

He stood beside the cradle, 

A tender-brooding care. 
Watching with love-illumined eyes 

The baby brother there. 

He stood beside the cradle, 

While busily without 
The mother ])lied her morning work 

The happy home about. 

Three moons had bloomed and faded 
Since ' Baby ' earthward came. 

Nor yet with seeking far or near 
Was found a fittins: name. 



NOH^ LITTLE JO, ETC. 107 

Anon the door was opened, — 
The mother paused and smiled, 

As, face all tremulous with joy, 
Up spake the little child : 

' Mamma, I 've named the baby ! ' 
' You have ? What is it, Jo ? ' 

' I 'm going to call him God, Mamma, 
That 's the best name I know.' 

O depth of heavenly wisdom 

Alone to love unsealed, — 
Hid from the wise and prudent ones 

And unto babes revealed 1 

Wee prophet of the Highest, 

Who touched thy little tongue 
To speak so clear the holiest thought 

That e'er was said or sung? 

The preaching of the pulpit 

Seems vague and far away, 
Beside thy bolder faith that sees 

' Immanuel ' to-day. 



108 HOW LITTLE JO, ETC. 

Ah, well if in each other, 
As through the world we go, 

We saw what in that babe was seen 
And named by little Jo 1 

Cleveland, 1886 



IN THE ALBULA PASS. 

To right, to left, the mountain wall — 
Above, the narrow strip of sky ; 

And at my feet the Albiila stream 
With youth's impatience rushes by. 

The air comes cool from snowy heights 
And tonic with the breath of pine ; 

Around me like a glory spread 

The flowers in rainbow beauty shine. 

I leave the cares that weighed me down. 
The heat and burden of the plain ; 

I feel the strengthening of the hills 
And drink the wine of youth again. 

Why thus in haste, bright mountain stream. 
To leave these haunts, so fair to me, 

Full soon to find the dusty plain, 
Too soon the all-engulfing sea? 



110 IN THE ALBULA PASS 

There comes a voice, — the streams can 
speak ! — 

' Fair is my home and youth is free, 
And glad my days, yet will I go 

On to the plain, the unknown sea I 

' For life is motion and not rest, 
Nor fear I what at last shall be ; 

The Hand that raised these mountain heights 
Has scooped the hollows of the sea 1 ' 

I turn me from the happy stream, 
All bright the years before me lie ; 

The mountains sink as up I climb. 
And nearer grows the widening sky. 

Canton Grisons, July, 1888 



CORONADO BEACH 

The air is tonic with the salty breath 
Of coursing billows that at last are free ; 
Sounds low and sweet old Ocean's symphony, 
Whose thought the varying heart inter- 

preteth. 
With upturned face and folded palms in 

death 
Lies Corpus Christi in mute effigy ; 
Point Loma, sphinx-like, gazes o'er the sea 
Nor heeds the questioning wave that breaks 

beneath. 
Along the shore the solemn mountains keep 
Their immemorial watch ; in yonder town, 
Sheltered between them and the curving 

deep, 
Unheard the tides of Hfe move up and down. 

peace of Nature ! here my burdens fall, 

1 rest upon the mighty Heart of all ! 

San Diego, February, 1894 



DOVER 

Mouse-hole in December, 

Quiet little Dover ! 
What shall I remeiuLer, 

Now the days are over? 

Snow in hushes falling ; 

Blue days creeping by ; 
Trees in still processions 

Etched upon the sky ; 
And a silent village 

Where the gray stones lean, 
Whispering of a Dover 

They alone have seen. 

All I shall remember, 

Now the days are over, — 

Mouse-hole in December, 
Quiet little Dover 1 



DOVER 113 

When I shall be lying 

With a gray stone over, 
Will this great World dim to 

Just a little Dover? 

Dover, Mass., 1886 



WE SEE AS WE ARE 

The poem hangs on the berry-bush, 
When comes the poet's eye ; 

The street begins to masquerade, 
When Shakespeare passes by. 

The Christ sees white in Judas' heart. 

He loves his traitor well; 
And God, to angel his new Heaven, 

Explores his lowest Hell. 

1885 



TREE-SURPRISE 

There 's a rapture in the air, 
Thrilling all the branches bare 
With the musical vibrations of an unheard 
tune; 
Silent trees in winter trance 
Feel a something in them dance, — 
Then a leaf and bud commotion, and a world 
one June ! 

There 's a trouble in the air. 
And a fog of white despair ; 
Stiff and black the trees are standing, — - are 
they dead, all dead ? 
In an hour I lift my eyes. 
And, behold ! a tree-surprise, — 
Every twig is flashing crystal from the white 
gloom bred 1 



116 TREE-SURPRISE 

Unheard music in the air, 
Is it rapture or despair 
In my tree of life the Hands will play for 
this day's tune ? 
But why ask it or why care, 
With that gloom-born beauty there, 
And the Hands to play December that shall 
yet play June ? 

1885 



A DAY IN OCTOBER 

I LEAVE behind the crowded street, 

The city's noise and stir, 
And face to face with Nature meet, - 

Her happy worshipper. 

I walk the unfrequented road 

With open eye and ear ; 
I watch afield the farmer load 

The bounty of the year. 

I filch the fruit of no man's toil, 

No trespasser am I, 
And yet I reap from every soil 

And the unmeasured sky. 

I gather where I did not sow, 
And bind in mystic sheaf 

The amber air, the river's flow. 
The rustle of the leaf, — 



118 A DAY IN OCTOBER 

The squirrels' chatter in the trees, 

The sunlight sifted down, 
The wholesome odors on the breeze 

O'er ripened harvests blown, — 

The hills in distance purple-hued, 

The tinkling waterfall, 
The ' deep contentment of the wood,' 

The peace o'erbrooding all. 

The maples glow beside the streams 

And fleck the pastures sear, 
Like smiles that break from happy dreams, ■ 

So smiles the waning year ! 

A beauty springtime never knew 

Haunts all the quiet ways. 
And sweeter shines the landscape through 

Its veil of autumn haze. 

The blessing of the early rain 

And all the summer's shine 
Are garnered in the golden grain 

And purple of the vine. 



A DAY IN OCTOBER 119 

What though the groves are silent all, 

No bird within them sinsfs, 
Nor on the quiet meadows fall 

Shadows from sunlit wings : 

Yet is their summer music part 

Of the still atmosphere, — 
So Nature keeps by subtle art 

To sight what pleased the ear. 

And all my separate senses seem 

To be but passive keys, 
Whereon she plays her world-old theme 

To wondrous harmonies. 

I face the hills, the streams, the wood. 

And feel with all akin ; 
I ope my heart, — their fortitude 

And peace and joy flow in. 

Like him of old on Horeb's mount 

I take again my way. 
New-strengthened from the healing fount 

Of this October day. 

Michigan, 1892 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 



Page 

* A cloud received hiin out of sight' ... 62 

A little House of Life 31 

Along the pathless prairie 72 

A rugged rock is the mountain 67 

As silent as the sun-gleam in the forest . . 29 

Bring, Morn, thy music! Bring, Night, 

thy hushes 11 

From age to age they gather 40 

From many ways and wide apart .... 89 

Gazing upon that face where years have 

wrought 70 

He laid his rocks in courses 46 

He stood beside the cradle 106 

I dreamed of Paradise, —and still .... 99 

I leave behind the crowded street .... 117 

In Father Time's old nursery 95 

I saw a veteran to-day 101 

It sounds along the ages 48 

Lo, the Day of days is here 57 



122 INDEX OP FIRST LINES 

Page 

'Mid my life's vicissitude 30 

Mouse-hole in December 112 

No rights of gravity to thee, dear friend . . 76 
'Notliing but a poet! ' So he said, and won- 
dered 68 

No thrush at eve had ever sweeter song . . 66 

Not when, with self dissatisfied 33 

Fount of Being's sea 22 

O Light, from age to age the same .... 42 

Lord of Life, where'er they be 50 

One thing I do ; the things behind forgetting 35 

On e3-es that watch through sorrow's night . 51 

On the Judaean hills 59 

On the rock and girt with ice 14 

Prophet souls of all the years 9 

Thou in lonely vigil led 13 

Thou whose Spirit witness bears .... 20 

Over hills and valleys 26 

Over the land in glory 55 

Play it slowly, sing it lowly 97 

Sleep, my little Jesus 64 

So early lost, I cannot tell the lift .... 87 

So still ! The little bird sits on the window-sill 84 

Still stands the ancient meeting-house ... 91 

The air is tonic with the salty breath . . . Ill 

The morning hangs its signal 16 



INDEX OP FIRST LINES 123 

Page 

The poem hangs on the berry-bush .... 114 

There in the nursery stood the case .... 103 

There 's a rapture in the air 115 

They came, bringuig spices, at break of the day 52 

The sunset glow is ebbing 82 

* Thirty thousand ! ' said the Fate .... 77 

This edelweiss I wear was not first mine . . 15 

Thy kingdom come, — on bended knee . . 18 
Thy work abides, though thou hast passed 

from sight 75 

To right, to left, the mountain wall .... 109 

Unto thee, abiding ever 24 

What do you see, dear hill-top pair .... 79 

Whatsoever is just and pure 38 

What will the violets be 54 

Where men on mounts of vision 44 



THE 

THOUGHT OF GOD 

IN 

HYMNS AND POEMS 

Cferee SStim in (Bnz 

FREDERICK L. HOSMER 

AND 

WILLIAM C. GANNETT 



Wijixti S>zxizi, 



BOSTON 

THE BEACON PRESS 

1918 



Copyright, igi8 

BY FREDERICK L. HOSMER AND 
WILLIAM C. GANNETT 



Stanbope S>rcs0 

H. GILSON COMPANY 
BOSTON, U. S. A. 



CONTENTS 



Page 



The Uncreated Law . . 
The Prophecy Sublime . 
Hear, O ye Nations . . . 
A People Blest of God . 
The Undertone .... 
•The Goodly Fellowship 

Prophets' 

Our Hidden Peace . . . 
Thrice Fifty Years . . . 
Dedication of Parish House 
The New-built Shrine 
A Fourfold Jubilee . 
A Century of Peace 
The New-World's Prophecy 
The Miracle Unbroken . 

Daily Bread 

Easter Gladness .... 
The Star of Bethlehem . 
Mother and Child . . . 
A Woodland Christening 
The City of God .... 
Harvard Divinity School 

Emerson 

Abraham Lincoln . . . 
Forward through the Ages 



of 



the 



F. L. H. 



(3) 



CONTENTS 



Page 

Cloisters of the Spirit W. C. G. . . 44 

Ordination " . . 46 

Motlier and Child " . . 48 

Kindergartners " . . 49 

Snow " . . 50 

April " . . 53 

A Summer in the Silence of the 

Hills " . . 54 

* Bread— and Roses, too ' . . . " . . 58 

The Heart of June " . . 60 

And Still the Eyes that Lift . . " . . 61 

Earth's Way and Heaven's Way " . . 62 

On Love's Supreme " . . 63 

In the Old Watertown Burying- 

Ground •• . . 64 

• Grow Old Along with Me ' . . " . . 70 

Sunset " . . 71 

Abraham Lincoln, Forever ... " . . 72 

O Mother Nigh-Forgotten ... " . . 74 

The Christ of the Andes .... •' . . 77 

Joy of Morning " . . 79 

America at the Peace Confer- 
ence : 1899 " . . 81 

America Redempta : 1917-18 . . " . . 85 

Before the Exposition " . . 88 

1918 " . . 90 



(4) 



THE UNCREATED LAW 

Still loom the Sinais, rugged, grand, 

With lightning-flash and thunder, 
Awakening the slumberous land 
To mingled dread and wonder. 
The uncreated Law 
Men own, and stand in awe ; 
' Thou shalt ' and ' thou shalt not ' 
Self-will can ne'er out- blot : 
That Law stands fast forever ! 

It flameth in the spirit's sky. 

To every soul appealeth ; 
It holds the keys of destiny. 
The nations' doom it sealeth. 
It casteth down the proud, 
Uplifts the poor and bowed ; 
O'erwhelms the wrong in night, 
With victory crowns the right : 
And it shall rule forever ! 



THE UNCREATED LAW 

Though clothed with terror to our sin, 

That Law is our salvation ; 
It hurts to heal, it warns to win, 
Each erring soul and nation. 
Behind it is a Face 
All tenderness and grace ; 
Let every soul obey, - 

Ye lands, prepare the way ; 
On earth God's kingdom cometh ! 

Music : Luther's ' Ein' feste Burg.' 1911 



THE PROPHECY SUBLEME 

Thy kingdom come, O Lord, 
Wide-circling as the smi ; 

Fulfil of old thy word 

And make the nations one : 

One in the bond of peace, 
The service glad and free 

Of truth and righteousness, 
Of love and equity. 

Speed, speed the longed-for time 
Foretold by raptured seers, — 

The prophecy sublime, 
The hope of all the years : 

Till rise in ordered plan 
On firm foundations broad 

The commonwealth of man. 
The City of our God ! 



1904 



HEAR, O YE NATIONS 

Hear, hear, O ye Nations, and hearing 

obey 
The cry from the past and the call of to-day ! 
Earth wearies and wastes with her fresh 

life outpoured, 
The glut of the cannon, the spoil of the 

sword. 

Lo, dawns the new era, transcending the 

old, 
The poet's rapt vision, by prophet foretold ! 
From war's grim tradition- it maketh appeal 
To service of all in a world's commonweal. 

Home, altar and school, the mill and the 

mart. 
The workers afield, in science, in art, 
Peace-circled and sheltered, shall join to 

create 
The manifold life of the firm-builded State. 



HEAR, O YE NATIONS 9 

Then, then shall the empire of right over 

wrong 
Be shield to the weak and a curb to the 

strong ; 
Then justice prevail and, the battle-flags 

furled, 
The High Court of Nations give law to the 

world. 

A.nd thou, O my Country, from many made 

one, 
Last-born of the nations, at morning thy sun, 
Arise to the place thou art given to fill. 
And lead the world-triumph of peace and 

good-will ! 

National Peace Congress : Chicago, May, 1909 



A PEOPLE BLEST OF GOD 

Uplift the song of praise 
To him, our fathers^ God ! 
Who led them o'er the watery ways 
To lands mitrod : 
Seed of a race to be, 
Upon his New-World shore ; 
The home of Law and Lil^erty 
For evermore. 

Lift high the song of praise, 
O Nation grown in power ! 
Hold fast through good and evil days 
Thy glorious dower : 
The age-long hope fulfil, 
New-quickened at thy birth ; 
Thy strength thy God, whose righteous will 
Rules heaven and earth. 



A PEOPLE BLEST OP GOD 11 

Uplift the song of praise ! 
His love and wisdom own, 
Who leadeth still in unseen way\ 
By paths unknown. 
His purposes of old 
And promises endure, 
And through the circling years imiold, 
Forever sure. 

Lift high the song of praise 
And bless his holy Name ! 
Whose care above the passing days 
Abides the same : 
Our fathers' confidence 
Through all their pilgrimage ; 
Our dwelling-place and our defence 
From age to age. 

Music : • Yigdal ' ( * Leoni ' ) 1911 



THE UNDERTONE 

From old to new, with broadening sweep, 

The stream of life moves on ; 
And still its changing currents keep 

A changeless undertone. 

In prophet word and martyr faith, 

Vision of saint and seer, 
The poet's song, the hero's death, — 

That undertone we hear. 

A sense we have of things imseen 

Transcending things of time ; 
We catch, earth's broken chords between, 

The everlasting chime : 

And light breaks through the rifted haze 

In shining vistas broad ; 
We travel the eternal ways, 

Held by the hand of God. 



1900 



♦THE GOODLY FELLOWSHIP OF 
THE PROPHETS' 

Fkom age to age how grandly rise 

The prophet souls in line ! 
Above the passing centuries 

Like beacon-lights they shine. 

Through differing accents of the lip 
One message they proclaim, 

One growing bond of fellowship, 
Above all names one Name. 

They witness to one heritage, 
One Spirit's quickening breath, 

One widening reign, from age to age. 
Of freedom and of faith. 

Their kindling power our souls confess ; 

Though dead, they speak to-day : 
How great the cloud of witnesses 

Encompassing our way ! 



14 THE GOODLY FELLOWSHIP 

Through every race, in ever}- clime, 
One song shall yet be heard : 

Move onward in thy course sublime, 
O everlasting Word ! 

F. R. A. Festival, 1899 



OUR HIDDEN PEACE 

When shadows gather on our way, 
Fast deepening as the night, 

Be thou, O God, the spirit's stay, 
Oui' inward Light ! 

Amid the outward toil and strife, 
The world's dull roar and din. 

Still speak thy word of higher life, 
Thou Voice within ! 

When burdens sore upon us press. 

And vexing cares increase. 
Spring thou, a fount of quietness, 

Our hidden Peace ! 

Though fond hopes fail, and joy depart. 
And friends should faithless prove, 

O save us from the bitter heart, 
Indwelling Love ! 



THRICE FIFTY YEARS 

Here where our fathers built of old, 
Rough-hewn, their simple house of 
prayer, 

We meet to-day, a grateful fold, 
Of these thrice fifty years the heir. 

Through time and change, through birth 
and death. 
The stream of being ceaseless runs ; 
One hidden life of love and faith 
Binds through all change the sires and 
sons. 

Their record lives in all around, 

Lives in our ampler thought and hope ; 

Through them the earth is fairer ground, 
And life for us hath larger scope. 

O Thou who workest all in all. 
We bless thee for our heritage: 

From out the past what voices call, 
What visions glad the coming age ! 



THRICE FIFTY YEARS 17 

Still hold us faithful to their trust 
Who wrought for better things to be, 

And when our flesh with theirs is dust, 
Grant us with them to rest in thee. 



NORTHBOROUGH, MASS.: First Congregational 
Church ( Unitarian ), June 3, 1896 



DEDICATION OF A PARISH-HOUSE 

Through willing heart and helping hand, 
Behold achieved our long desire ! 

And gathered here, a household band, 
We light to-night the household fire. 

Be welcomed here the old, the young, 
The rich, the poor, the prince and thrall : 

Be Jesus' motto high uphung, — 
Who serveth most is chief of all. 

Let mirth and pastime speed the hour, 
The lighter moods that ease our care : 

Here graver themes, through lips of power, 
Give guidance to the ways we fare ! 

May human fellowship here take 
A radiance from the altar's glow, 

And kindlier hearts, new-quickened, make 
From purer founts its worship flow I 



DEDICATION OP A PARISH-HOUSE 19 

O Thou whose service, wide and free, 
Is inward strength and light and cheer, 

Be this our bond of unity 

And fire the souls that gather here ! 

Bbbkblby, Caik, Sept. 10, 1909 



THE NEW-BUILT SHRIKE 

The outward temple stands complete, 
Fulfilment of our long desire ; 

And while our hearts responsive beat 
We light anew our altar fire. 

Yet neither wholly new nor strange 
Can seem this house to which we come ; 

So much we bring that knows not change 
To give these walls the touch of home : 

The inspirations of the past, 
The fellowships of kindred aim, 

The treasured memories that hold fast, 
The vanished whom we silent name. 

And now, with forward faith and cheer, 
To life made daily more divine, 

To all that brings the Vision near, 
We dedicate the new-built shrine. 



THE NEW-BUILT SHRINE 21 

And Thou in whom we live and move, 
In whom our being rooted stands, 

Breathe in our hearts thy living love 
And crown the labor of our hands ! 

Church of the Unity : St. Louis, 1917 



A FOURFOLD JUBILEE 

Uplifted be the voice of praise 
As far and near, beloved Town, 

Thy children throng from many ways 
Thy fourfold jubilee to crown ! 

Still echoed in thy history 

We catch the high heroic strain, 

The Pilgrim faith that crossed the sea 
For truth and right and freedom's gain. 

And worthy sons of noble sires 

Have passed the torch of knowledge on 
Through paths of peace and battle-fires 

Have to the old new triumphs won. 

We reap the fields the fathers cleared, 
The harvest of their toil and care ; 

The ampler life by them upreared. 
Fulfilment of their faith and prayer. 



A FOURFOLD JUBILEE 23 

O Thou by whom our fathers wrought, 
Our strength through all the ages down, 

Whose Providence thus far hath brought, 
Still guard and bless our ancient Town ! 

Framingham, Mass. : Bicentennial, June 13, 
1900 



A CENTURY OF PEACE 

Across a century's border-line 
Unmarked by frowning fort or sign, 
To-day as one, with differing name, 
A kindred heritage we claim : 

The heritage of those born free 
To shape the onward destiny 
Of church and state to nobler plan. 
The crowning commonwealth of man. 

Blest be the Providence that bore 
Our fathers to this New-World shore, 
And trained a vigorous stock to be 
Upbuilders of democracy. 

Their task, committed to our trust. 
We steadfast hold and hold we must, 
Till all America shall own 
The harvest from their planting grown ; 



A CENTURY OF PEACE 25 

Yea, till the ever narrowing tide 
No more the continents divide, 
And through all lands beneath the sun 
The severed nations meet as one ! 



General Unitarian Conference, Montreal, 
Sept., 1917; Unveiling of Commemorative Tablet 
in the church. 



THE NEW-WORLD'S PROPHECY 

O Blest the souls that see and hear 
The things of God to-day revealed, 

Of old to longing saint and seer 
Within the future closely sealed : 

The stir of nations near and far, 
The wakened hearts that beat as one, 

The flow of peace, the ebb of war, 
The passing night, the risen sun ! 

Be ours the vision, ours the will 
To follow, though the faithless ban; 

The love that triumphs over ill. 
The trust in God and hope for man. 

And thou whose tides of purpose bear 
These mortal lives that come and go, 

Give us to feel through toil and prayer 
Thy deep eternal underflow ! 



THE MIRACLE UNBROKEN 

Now while the day in trailing splendor 
Gives way to glories of the night, 

Thanksgiving to thy name we render, 
Lord of the darkness and the light ! 

Daily from thee we have our being, 
In all this wondrous order set ; 

Thine omnipresence blinds our seeing, 
And in thy gifts we thee forget. 

Touch thou our eyes, their blindness healing, 
Until the common earth and air 

To our illumined sight and feeling 
Thy glory and thyself declare : 

Till storied marvel, sign and token. 
All pale before the nearer thought 

Of the vast miracle unbroken, 

Hour unto hour around us wrought. 

1904 



DAILY BREAD 

* This day our daily bread,' — 

O heart, be satisfied ; 
Enough for thee if daily need 

Be day by day supplied. 

This day our daily bread, — 
Be simple wants thy wealth : 

The modesty of thy desires 
Shall be thy spirit's health. 

This day thy daily bread, — 
And He who doth provide 

The lesser things will surely add 
All thou dost need beside. 

This day our daily bread, — 
So shall the simple prayer 

Keep thee in daily thought of him 
Who makes thy loaf his care. 



1915 



EASTER GLADNESS 

O DAY of light and gladness, 

Of prophecy and song, 
What thoughts within us waken, 

What hallowed memories throng ! 
The soul's horizon widens. 

Past, present, future blend ; 
And rises on our vision 

The life that hath no end. 

Earth feels the season's joyance ; 

From mountain-range to sea 
The tides of life are flowing. 

Fresh, manifold and free. 
In valley and on upland, 

By forest pathways dim, 
All Nature lifts in chorus 

The resurrection hymn. 



30 EASTER GLADNESS 

O Lord of life eternal, 

To thee our hearts upraise 
The Easter song of gladness, 

The Passover of praise. 
Thine are the many mansions, 

The dead die not to thee, 
Who fillest from thy fullness 

Time and eternity. 

1905 



THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM 

Not over great Jerusalem 

Rested the mystic star of old, 
But over little Bethlehem, — 

In holy legend we are told. 
The watching shepherds heard with awe 

And felt the brush of unseen wings ; 
While from afar the wise men saw 

And joyful came with offerings. 

It passed the mighty of the earth, 

The pride of wealth, the pomp of kings, 
To mark a prophet's lowly birth 

And shame the scorn of common things. 
Nor beat of drum nor bugle cry 

Announced on earth his coming reign. 
But ' Glory be to God on high, 

On earth be peace, good will to men ! ' 



32 THE STAR OP BETHLEHEM 

Still go before us, mystic star, 

Our dull and blinded eyes to clear ; 
We follow with the wise men far. 

And with the wondering shepherds hear. 
Again the angel hosts draw nigh, 

With them we sing the Christmas strain : 
* All glory be to God on high, 

On earth be peace, good will to men ! ' 

Christmas, 1893 



MOTHER AND CHILD 

Again the angel song we hear, 

The guiding star we see ; 
The mighty of the earth draw near 

To helpless infancy. 

And ever as the year grows old, 

Within the simple lines 
Of the familiar story told 

A deeper meaning shines. 

In every happy mother's face 
To-day, the wide world o'er, 

There speaks to us a tenderer grace 
For Mary's joy of yore : 

And every new-born child of earth 

A glory doth receive, 
Reflected from the Christ-child's birth 

On that first Christmas eve. 

Christmas, 1903 



A WOODLAND CHRISTENING 

Beneath these woodland arches dim 
To us made holy ground, 

Beside the smooth lake's mirrored rim 
By mountains girt around, — 

With grateful hearts, O God, to thee 
From whom his being came, 

This little child we dedicate 
And in thy Name would name. 

May he each year in knowledge grow, 
In wisdom and in grace, — 
V That inmost blessing ever know 

Of those who see thy face. 

The bounty of the friendly air, 
The joy of laughing rills, 

The peace o'erbrooding everywhere, 
Strength of the lasting hills, — 



A WOODLAND CHRISTENING 35 

The beauty sky and earth between, 

The spirit of this hour, 
Their love who watch, unseen and seen, 

Be his baptismal dower ! 

For J. B. M. : Birchbay, June 28, 1910 



THE CITY OF GOD 

'■For he looked for the city which hath the foundations, 
whose builder and maker is God.' 

In thee we meet on kindred ground, 

O Pilgrim City by the sea, — 
By one high faith and purpose bound, 

Pilgrims toward better things to be. 

The separating seas are crossed. 
Each heart is understood of each ; 

On this our day of Pentecost 

Fade out the lines of race and speech. 

One heritage alike we share, 

Transcendent, jedr by year more vast, — 
The widening thought and hope and prayer, 

The gathered good of all the past. 

And one the goal to which we press 
By toilsome paths as yet untrod, — 

Earth's longed-for reign of righteousness, 
The shining City of our God ! 

International Congress of Religious Liberals : 
Boston, Sept., 1907 



HARVARD DIVINITY SCHOOL 

Within these walls what voices break 
The silence to the inward ear ! 

What memories rise and visions wake 
Of friendly guides, of prophet, seer: 

The forbears of our household name 
Whose lives within our own we feel, 

Who from the halls of Harvard came 
And bore upon their hearts her seal. 

Unbound by outgrown rite and creed, 
Yet nurtured from a living past, 

They dared to trust the Spirit's lead 
Nor deemed its latest word the last. 

Here be our holiest vows renewed. 
Here be reconsecrate our powers ; 

The love of truth, the prayerful mood 
That stayed the fathers still be ours ! 

Harvard Divinity School Centennial : 
Divinity Hall, 1916 



EMERSON 

No prophet of the wilderness, 

Rough-clad and stern of speech, he came ; 
None knew him by the outward dress, 

And few foresaw the coming fame. 

But they who listened to him caught 

A music soft as April rain ; 
O'er the brown fields of faith and thought 

The airs of springtime breathed again. 

All ministries that wait on man 

His soul receptive learned to know ; 

The stream that through his meadow ran 
Ran double with a mystic flow. 

Along the plain familiar way 

Fresh truth from living wells he drew ; 
In life, in nature, night and day. 

The glory of the One broke through. 



EMERSON 39 

No more the living voice is heard, 

The pines he loved stand o'er his dust ; 

The gospel of his life and word 
The coming ages hold in trust. 

Emerson Centennial : May 25, 1903 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

The prairies to the mountains call, 

The mountains to the sea ; 
From shore to shore a nation keeps 

Her martyr's memory. 

Though lowly born, the seal of God 

Was in that rugged face : 
Still from the humble Nazareths come 

The saviors of the race. 

With patient heart and vision clear 
He wrought through trying days, — 

'Malice toward none, with love for all,' 
Unswerved by blame or praise. 

And when the morn of Peace broke through 

The battle's cloud and din, 
He hailed with joy the promised land 

He might not enter in. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 41 

He seemed as set by God apart, 

The winepress trod alone ; 
l^ow stands he forth an uncrowned king, 

A people's heart his throne. 

Land of our loyal love and hope, 

O Land he died to save, 
Bow down, renew to-day thy vows 

Beside his martyr grave ! 

Centennial Hymn : February 12, 1909 



FORWARD THROUGH THE AGES 

Forward through the ages, 

In unbroken line, 
Move the faithful spirits 

At the call divine : 
Gifts in differing measure, 

Hearts of one accord, 
Manifold the service. 
One the sure reward. 
Forward through the ages. 

In unbroken line. 
Move the faithful spirits 
At the call divine. 

Wider grows the kingdom, 

Reign of love and light ; 
For it we must labor. 

Till our faith is sight. 
Prophets have proclaimed it, 

Martyrs testified, 
Poets sung its glory. 

Heroes for it died. 
Refrain : Forward through the ages. 



FORWARD THROUGH THE AGES 43 

Not alone we conquer, j 

Not alone we fall ; 
In each loss or triumph 

Lose or triumph all. 
Bound by God's far purpose 

In one living whole, 
Move we on together 

To the shining goal ! 
Refrai7i : Forward through the ages. 

1908 



CLOISTERS OF THE SPIRIT 

God laid his rocks in courses, 

With greenwood crowned the hill ; 
To yoke the ancient forces 

He led the new-born will ; 
Man's will he woke to duty, 

He graced the hand that wrought, - 
Till in the temple's beauty 

The Soul its Father sought. 

To cloisters of the spirit 

These aisles of quiet lead : 
Here shall the vision gladden, 

The voice within us plead ; 
And may the dear All-Father, 

Who maketh trouble cease, 
Here send his three strong angels. 

Contrition, Hope and Peace ! 



CLOISTERS OP THE SPIRIT 45 

The song these walls shall echo 

Be song the heart within, 
The prayer in consecration's 

Sweet solitudes begin ! 
Work on, O silent Builder, 

Perfect the inner shrine, 
Till song pass into service, 

Prayer into life divine ! 

Here be no man a stranger ; 

No holy cause be banned ; 
No good for one be counted, 

Not good for all the land ; 
And here for prophet- voices 

The message never fail, — 
' God reigns ! his Truth shall conquer, 

And Right and Love prevail ! ' 

1911. Altered from pages 46, 47 in Series 11 



ORDINATION 

Still comes the Call to who will hear ! 
A listening spirit heard, 

And fain would go with message clear 
To be the living Word. 

O holy Voices, bid to-day- 
All thought of self to cease, — 

In God alone his strength and stay, 
His gladness and his peace ! 

Ordain in him the seeker's mind 

Of eager, trusting youth, 
That hastens forth each morn to find 

Fresh manna-falls of truth: 
Ordain the constant heart to take 

The side of outcast Right, 
In duty's rocky fields to make 

His gardens of delight. 



ORDINA TION 47 

Give him the eyes that pity men, 

The tones that stir and thrill, 
The broken heart to heal again, 

To brace the faltering will ; 
A vision of the Eternal Face, 

Where others' sight grows dim : 
A prophet truthing it in grace, i 

The Christ, ordain in him ! 

Nor one alone : in all, O God, 

For nobler ministry 
On heights of life as yet untrod. 

Awake the glad ' Send me ! ' 
Use us for braver words and deeds, 

For toil with love ashine, — 
Our heart-beat timed to human needs, 

Our wills made one with thine ! 

1911. 1 'dAijtJeuoj'Tes 5e kv d\dnj),' Eph. iv: 15 



MOTHER AND CHILD 

' God could not be everywhere, so he made Mothers ' 

When, among all life's miracles, I try 
What highest argument may certify 
That God is good, however things may seem, 
On this I rest, — and evil dims to dream : 
Each little Soul that voyages toward birth, 

When it arrives on earth , 

Its first sea-mysteries o'er, 
Makes gentle land-fall on a Mother's breast! 

This, too, I think : If mother-rapture wait 
Each helpless advent on Time's island- 
shore, 
Must not Eternity, the continent. 
Have harbors all as safe ? I ask no more. 
It did not know its port, that little Soul, — 
Unsteering found its goal : 
Fear naught, my Soul, sail on. 
With orders sealed sail on, to find Life's 
Best! 

1901 



KINDERGARTNERS 

' The child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with 

wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.' 

' We are laborers together with God.' 

Co-workers we with God! Were he to 
ask, 

* Come, star with me the spaces of my night, 
Or fashion forth the crystals of my snow, 
Or tone with me to-morrow's sunset light. 
Or teach my sweet June roses next to 

blow,' — 
O rare beatitude ! But holier task. 
Of all his works of beauty fairest-high, 
Is that he keeps for hands like ours to ply ! 
When he upgathers all his elements. 
His days, his nights, whole eons of his June, 
The Mighty Gardener of the earth and sky, 
That to achieve toward which the ages roll. 
Creation's blossom, beautiful, intense. 
We hear the Voice that sets the spheres a- 

tune, — 

* Help me, O comrades, flower this little 

Soul ! ' 



For the Kindergartners' Conference in Koches- 

TBR. N. Y., 1904 



SNOW 

Winter-silent is the land, 
Winter whiteness everywhere ; 

Hid as in a folded hand 
Waits a wonder of the air. 

Grey and slumber-sealed the skies -. 

Something mystic broods between, 
Ambush of the still surprise, 

Unseen glory in the seen. 

Suddenly the heavenly ways 
People with a starry host, 

Moving down, a whirling maze, 
To invade the earthly coast. 

Hour on hour the crystal shapes 
Flash into their perfect form : 

From the law not one escapes, 
Riot as it may the storm. 



SNOW 51 

Engineries of Nature's grace, 

Soundless, sure, invisible, 
What the power, and where the place, 

Of your endless miracle ? 

Apparitions born to die 

Million millions in a breath, 

Is your beauty signalling 
Life as very soul of Death ? 

Snow-flake, is thy symmetry 
Matter of divine concern, — 

Courses of the stars on high 
Hinting nothing more eterne ? 

If the snow-flake, what the Soul, — 

No concern, its little lot ? 
In the vastness of the Whole, 

Spirit-star, am I forgot ? 

Source of Beauty, make me know, 
Where my skies loom grey above, 

Lurks thy miracle of Snow, 
Radiant of law and love ! 



52 SNOW 

Winter-silent lies my land ? 

Over-brooding lies the Care ! 
Fast within a folded Hand 

Waits my glory of the air ! 



APRn. 

What's all the trouble 

Stirring the still ? 
Grasses are busy 

Greening the hill ; 
Rootlets are feeling 

Down in the dim ; 
Brooklets are stealing 

Through the dry limb ; 
Ferns are uncurling 

Out of the sere ; 
Woods are awaking, — 

Anemone's here ! 
Birds are re-sprinkling 

Song on the air ; 
Youths and the maidens 

Are going a-pair : 
What's all the trouble ? 

The Call of the Sun ! 

The Lure of the Skies ! 
Earth's trembling all over 

With atom-replies, — 
While Man, the one -word- wise, 
Laughs, ' April ! ' 



A SUMMER IN THE SILENCE OF 
THE HILLS 

A SUMMER in the silence of the hills ! 
Green waves of wilderness around us lay, 
Billows of sparkling forest, where by day 
Cloud-shadows moved and paused and 
loitered on, 
Until the brooding twilight made all shad- 
ows one. 

Cresting the hill our red-roofed Home 
uprose : 

The leafy paths wound in and out the 
trees 

That, nest-like, hid sweet cottage priva- 
cies; 

Far down, the leaping streamlet lit the 
Glen, 
And sang an ' Auld lang syne ' to ease the 
cares of men. 



IN THE SILENCE OF THE HILLS 55 

Nor these afar. Along the leagues we 

spake ; 
The trains like shuttles knit; into our 

hand 
Daily dropt love and tears froni every 

land; 
And God ! how clear across our hush the 

roar 
At dawn, at noon, at eve, those guns on 

China's shore ! 



Our comrades there, Friends of the Quiet 

Way 
And Simple Life, who greet with pronoun 

quaint 
We world-folk save for prayer or holy 

saint ; 
Who listen to their soul on First-day 

morn 
For the still voice of God, and hear the 

Word fresh-born. 



56 IN THE SILENCE OP THE HILLS 

Good grey-heads many; brows of sea- 
soned calm ; 
Eyes that when yoimg, in our sad history, 
Had watched on dim subways of liberty 
For dusky fugitives ; and feet, not few, 
Pickets of peace to-day in friendless causes 
new. 

Dear mother-hearts, life-tried and sorrow- 
wise; 

Quick, busy men, in weekly ebb and 
flow; 

A charm of bright-faced girls in rosy 
blow, 

At glancing games with merry-hearted 
boys; 
With all the little children's blessed, bub- 
bling noise. 



And he who found the daffodils a-dance, 
And gardened them forever in his song. 
Was with us everywhere the summer 
long; 



IN THE SILENCE OP THE HILLS hi 

Lover of hermit rills and mountain 
moods, 
And austere hearts of shepherds in green 
solitudes, — 

The Poet of plain living and high thought : 
As in the English lake beside his doors 
He saw his hills, so in his verse lay ours. 
Threefold our summer spell, threefold 
its grace, 
A rounding harmony of Poet, People, Place. 

A summer in the silence of the hills ! 
And now a haunted silence in the breast : 
There will its shadows glide, its twilights 

rest, 
The shining of the forest hold its gleam, 
And unforgotten faces light some happy 

dream. 

Buck Hill Falls, Pa., 1904 



'BREAD — AND ROSES, TOO' 

In every human heart 
A dreaming Jacob lies, 
And in the dream the ladders grow 
That reach up to the skies. 

It was a white-faced waif, 
Cold, hunger-thin, astray: 
« Now what in all the world,' one cried, 
' Would you like best to-day ? ' 

He thought of body's plight : 
Would it be doughnuts sweet, 
Or cakes, or tarts, or cherry-pie ? 
Perhaps a candy -treat ? 

Two wan eyes starred with light : 
* O may I really choose ? 
I want ' (in whisper-words it came) 
' Some — red — morocco — shoes ! ' 



'BREAD — AND ROSES, TOO' 59 

The old, old dream divine 
Of Beauty, ever new ! 
The bread we need, — the rose we want ; 
The bread, — but roses, too. 

And yet shall dawn a day, 
The day of dreams come true, 
When all, with bread, shall have the rose, — 
Bread, and the roses, too ! 

Meanwhile the gates swing soft, 
And down the secret stair, 
To comfort mortals on the road, 
The angels still repair. 

A sermon-catch from E. A. R., 1912 



THE HEART OF JUNE 

With a copy of 'Aucassin and Ntcollette ' 

A GREENNESS of June, a warble of birds, 

A breath of roses a-blow, 
And a man and a maid in love, in love. 

Six hundred summers ago ! 

O who would care for the song or rose, 
Or who would care for the green. 

Had June forgotten to love, to love, 
In ever a summer between ? 

Come, green of the June, and warble of bird. 
And breath of roses a-blow, — 

But heart of you all are two who love 
As two in the long ago ! 

To Beth and Bert, June 14, 1898 



AND STILL THE EYES THAT LIFT 

I KNOW it all, — the lift, the light, the 

peace, 
That heavenward drew in eyes of Beatrice. 
And not by courteous messenger her 

grace, — 
Herself she came in her own blessed face. 
In the Dark Wood of an uncertain will 
She found me groping for the Sunlit Hill . 
I followed : mine no Dante-path of woe, 
Nor terraces where painful pilgrims go. 
She came, — the Dark Wood stirred with 

flower and breeze, 
And bird-song trembled in the happy trees ! 
She came, — and Sunlit Hill, the Eunoe 

Fount, 
The Earthly Paradise, were mine ! Where 

she 
With unreturning feet still comrades me ; 
And still the eyes that lift, — and still I 

mount ! 

On her Fiftieth Birthday, 1904 



EARTH'S WAY AND HEAVEN'S WAY 

What shall we be in that strange land, 

So near and yet so far, 
So just beyond a single breath, — 

But absolute the bar ? 

It may be * I,' it may be ' You,' 

It may be closelier one, — 
Life within life ; and Earth's old way 

Seem hardly life begun. 

But O so sweet this little while 
First to be ' You ' and ' I ', — 

To see, to hear, to touch, — to love, 
Earth's way, ere Heaven we try ! 



1913 



ON LOVE'S SUPREME 

Love-lighted to the end, she may have 

thought, 
As in she passed, ' When was I here before?' 
And when the radiant faces, more and more, 
With old-home smiles their eager welcome 

brought, 
Amid the gentle din she must have sought 
His voice familiar at some opening door, 
Ware of no change, love-folded as of yore, 
Nor dreaming what Death's miracle had 

wrought. 

Happy such morrows to love-lighted days ! 
The Heaven to her as Earth with him had 

been, — 
The Earth to him as Heaven, because, 

within. 
Her memories still vision all his ways. 
High on Love's sweet supreme the two 

confess, 
« Death teacheth us the things of Deathless- 

ness ! ' 

To Z. P. S. and A. C. S., 1904 



The Old Watertown Burying-Ground lies, not in neg- 
lect, but in happy disregard, not far above Mount 
Auburn, on Mount Auburn Street. There are three or 
four pillar-tomb stones in it, such as our forefathers set 
over the dust of dignitaries and worthies. On one of 
these the inscription reads : 



PIOUS LYDIA MADE & GIVEN 
BY GOD AS A MOST MEET 
HELP TO JOHN BAILEY 
MINISTER OF Y GOSPELL 

GOOD BETIMES * BEST AT LAST 

LIVED BY FAITH * DIED IN PEACE 

WENT OFF SINGING * LEFT US WEPING 
WALKT WITH GOD TILL TRANSLATED 

IN Y 39 YEARE OF HER AGE 
APRIL Y 16, 1691 

READ HER EPITAPH 

IN PROv. 31. 10, 11, 12, 28, 29, 30, 31 



IN THE OLD WATERTOWN BUEY- 
ING GROUND 

Here in the shade throuorh all the chano-- 

o 
ing years 

She lies, to whom the wilderness gave 

love; 
Here did they hide her, and their falling 

tears 
Dropped record m the stone they carved 

above. 
From hearts of stern old Pm-itans these 

words. 
When few and stranger in the land their 

race, 
And grey wolves howled at night around 
her resting-place. 

The few to many grew, the many one, 
Till children's children played by far- 
thest seas. 
The wars have come and gone. With 
every smi 



66 IN THE OLD BURYING GROUND 

Griefs fade like leaves. And still be- 
neath the trees 

The love-words cling as lichens to their 
rock. 

Before the Charles its forest murmur 
ceased 
The river-parish mourned this gentle 
woman-priest. 

What was she in her face, her tones, 

her smile ? 
The eyes, wherein the silent song abode 
Her linnet heart sang inwardly the while, 
Till, at the end outbreaking, their tears 

flowed ? 
No echo lingers, no tradition tells : 
A village saint, forgot of legend's art. 
Unknown Madonna of the Puritanic heart. 

Yet moss-grown words hold secrets. 

' Good betimes,' — 
That hints a charm of early maiden ways ; 
And ' Best at last,' — the growth in grace, 

the chimes 



IN THE OLD BURYING GROUND 67 

Of woman's powers perfecting with the 

days. 
* She walkt with God ' : the Someone- 

with-her felt 
Woke sense of holy place in Watertown, 
And woodland paths knew quiet above their 
wonted own. 

The cull of verses from the wise old book 
Tell her two joys, — the joy of mother's 

breast 
Enfolding little ones ; the following look 
In husband-eyes that speaks a heart at 

rest, 
The while he praises God at morn and eve 
Because she is his very loving wife, 
The constant pleasantness of all his days of 

life. 

' The heliDmeet of their minister,' it reads : 
Angel of their rough homesteads ; hands 

and feet 
A gentleness at bed-sides ; to slow needs 
Of age a comforter ; a face that windows 

greet, 
And blessings wait in closets of the heart ; 



68 IN THE OLD BURYING GROUND 

One whom the barefoot children laugh to 
meet ; 
To whom glad youths and maidens bring 
their secret sweet. 

And on the Lord's Day in the parish-pew, 
Straight-backed, uncushioned, like the 

creed's content, 
I see her lips interpreting anew 
In terms of love the preacher's argument ; 
Her eyes reflect the fervors of his prayer. 
Full oft her heart to heaven had sung its 

way 
Before the angel- voices bade, ' Come in and 

stay ! ' 

She ' went off singing ' — and ' left us to 

wepe ' : 
The love-words lie dim-lettered in the 

stone. 
Still in the shadows here remembrance 

keep. 
Across two himdred Jimes the song, the 

moan ; 
Two hundred snows of silence on them 

sleep. 



IN THE OLD BURYING GROUND 69 

With battle -thoughts forlorn, one day I 

strolled, 
To find, and love again, the parish-saint of 

old. 

1918 



♦GROW OLD ALONG WITH ME' 

Age makes confession, if it urge 

That grey of head is boyhood's brown : 

Is ebbing wave the shoreward surge ? 
Does Autumn wear an April gown ? 

Although at morn and even play 
The mysteries of twilight dim, 

It IS an empty word to say 

The evening is the morning hymn. 

But nothing is it less divine. 
With all the holy night in fee : 

The Morning, and one world was mine ; 
The Night, — a heaven of worlds I see ! 

O joy for what the years teach well, 

The trust that this one world we know — 

How bright, how dear, no song can tell — 
Of those is only embryo ! 

For a Seventieth Birthday, 1907 



SUNSET 

Sweet hill-top sessions wait you yet, 
Watch-hours before your own sunset, 
Life's clouds to quiet glory made, 
And twilight folding shade on shade. 

Then song of the Hidden Thrush, — 
Far- widening hush, — 

And silence, — and the stars ! 

To H. G. S., on his Seventy-fifth Birthday, 1912 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN, FOREVER 

Tune, '■Marching throuqh Georgia ' 

Born in a log-cabin, and he had a spelling- 
book, — 
That was all the outfit that the little Abram 

took: 
King of Hearts it made him ! When he 
died, the country shook, — 

Abraham Lincoln, forever ! 
Hurrah ! hurrah ! he brought the Jubilee ! 
Hurrah ! hurrah ! the man who made us 

free ! 
Men shall sing his praises from the 
mountains to the sea, 

Abraham Lincoln, forever ! 

Dark along the North there hung the thun- 
der-clouds of war, 

Brightly gleamed the watch-fires on the 
Southern hills and shore, 

When uprose the gaunt-face hero, sound- 
heart to the core, — 

Abraham Lincoln, forever ! 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN FOREVER 73 

Black men for their freedom trembling, 

white men for their land, 
Watched the patient eyes that feared not, 

felt the steady hand, 
Knew that somehow God was with him, — 

Liberty would stand ! 

Abraham Lincoln, forever ! 

Heart without a nook for malice, only room 

for grace, 
All his will to pluck the thistle, plant the 

flower in place, — 
And he lived to save a nation, died to save 

a race, 

Abraham Lincoln, forever ! 

For the Rochester Boys' Evening Home, 1900 



MOTHER NIGH-FORGOTTEN 

^God bless my mother! All that lam, or ever hope to be, I 
owe to her.' Abraham Lincoln, 

O Mother nigh-forgotten, 

To-day, amid our joy, 
A thankful land remembers 

The Mother of the Boy ! 

Empires had aged and vanished ; 

The centuries imrolled ; 
A New World rose from shadow 

New cycles to unfold. 

Again the heavens yearned downward ; 

Again, in winter wild, 
The self-same stars were watching 

A Mother and a Child ; 

Again the manger-cradle. 

The oxen standing by. 
The humble folk low bending 

To catch a baby's cry. 



O MOTHER NIGH-FORGOTTEN 76 

O little knew that Mother, 

Madonna of the AVest, 
How Fate and Fame were watching 

The child upon her breast ! 

jSTo angel-vision showed her 
The spirit's growth in grace, 

The wisdom and the stature. 
The patience in the face. 

She heard no song of captives 

In rajiture of release ; 
No praising world acclaim him 

God's Messenger of Peace ; 

.Nor saw, across the Aprils, 

The form upon the rood, 
And a great nation shaken 

With grief and gratitude. 

The boy her heart had prayed for. 
And loved so mother-well, — 

No dream foretold him Savior, 
A land's Emmanuel. 



76 O MOTHER NIGH-PORGOTTEN 

Now, Woman of the birth-pangs, 

Mother, who never knew, 
With battle-scars outfaded, 

Our faces turn to you ! 

The four winds all are throbbing 

A chime of birthday bells ; 
Through North and South commingled 

One surge of gladness swells. 

O Mother nigh-forgotten, 

To day, amid our joy, 
A land al-1 thanks remembers 

The Mother of the Boy ! 

Abraham Lincoln's Hundredth Birthday, Febru- 
ary 12, 1909 



THE CHRIST OF THE ANDES 

'Zfow beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that 
bringeth good tidings, that puhlisheth peace ; that bringeth 
good tidings of good, that pubhsheth salvation ; that saith 
unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!' 

What gleams so bright on the mountain-top 
In the rise and set of the sun ? 

What rapture of song do the rivers shout, 
As down through the hills they run ? 

The Beautiful Feet have come, have come, 
Of him who publisheth Peace ! 

Who saith to the lands, The Good Godreigns, 
And the hells of War shall cease ! 

The angel-song in the skies of old 

At last is echoed of men : 
The Beautiful Feet have come, have come, — 

O never to go again ! 

Why linger there on the moimtain-tops ? 

Come down to the plain, the shore. 
To the noisy mart, to the plotting kings, 

And travel the wide earth o'er. 



78 THE CHRIST OP THE ANDES 

Come into our hearts, O Beautiful Feet, 
And man from his hate release ! 

The world is weary ; it listens, it longs 
For the foot-fall bringing Peace. 

Christmas, 1904 

In 1900, the sister Republics, Argentina and ChUe, 
were on the brink of war. It was an old dispute about 
boundary-lines. Good Bishop Benevente of Argentina 
appealed to his countrymen to settle the dispute by 
arbitration instead of war. King Edward of England 
was asked to be arbitrator, and the two nations quietly 
acquiesced in his decision. To signalize and perpetuate 
this victory of Peace, a colossal statue of Christ was 
dedicated, March 13, 1904. One hand holding his cross 
of sacrifice, the other uplifted to heaven, the Christ 
OF THE Andes stands on the boundary-line, fourteen 
thousand feet above the sea, blessing both countries as 
they lie below in peace. 



JOr OF MORNING 

' Weeping may tarry for a night, but Joy cometh in the 
morning.' 

Joy of morning in the skies, 
Laughter of the glad sunrise, 
Waking all the lands anew 
In the sparkle of the dew ! 

3oj of morning in the slow 
Upward climb of life aglow, — 
Rock to flower, and brute to face. 
Dawn in man of angel grace ! 

Joy of morning in the soul. 
Lighting it from goal to goal, 
Ever in wild hearts of youth 
Visioning a larger truth ! 

Joy of morning's break of song 
After starless nights of wrong. 
Gladdening history's tragic way, 
Prelude of a happier day ! 



80 JOY OP MORNING 

Hate and hurt the dark may fill, 
Light shall be the victor still. 
Freshening Spirit, living Breath, 
Rend once more the clouds of death ! 

Bring with thee an earth made new, 
Peace its sunrise, love its dew ! 
Lo, the Day-spring from on high, 
God's great morning in the sky ! 

1917 



AMERICA AT THE PEACE 
CONGRESS: 1899 

During her Conquest of the Philippines 

Why is she late at the Tryst of the Peace- 
makers ? 

Where is the youngest and fairest of all, 
Last-born of Liberty, darling of Destiny, 

Star of the stricken and hope of the thrall ? 

Russia is here from her jilains and her river- 
gates, 
England has come from her isles of the 
sea, 
Italy hastens aleap o'er the hill-tops, 

Germany, France, — they forget and 
agree. 

Why lags America ? Still at her chivalry, 
Saving some little one pressed by the foe ? 

Spending her treasure and sharing her 
privilege, 
Loosing the captive of hunger and woe ? 



S2 AT THE PEACE CONGRESS: i8gg 

Lo, she comes radiant! Lo, she comes 
beautiful ! 
Welcome and praise for her, hail to her 
deed! 
Place for the selfless one, room for the 
rescuer, 
' Rights of the People ' her banner and 
creed ! 

Red is her robe, — she is Land of the After- 
glow; 
Red-lit her cheek, — it is heart-glow her 
own. 
Red on her hands! Is it blood7 Dares 
America 
Mock the White Muster, red-handed 
alone ? 

All of the others are doffing war's garniture, 
Swordless and stainless and minded for 
peace ; 
She alone alien, unwashed of her battle- 
smoke, — 
Sea-winds pursuing her, shrieking ' Re- 
lease ! ' 



AT THE PEACE CONGRESS: i8qg 83 

Crownless she sits there, imstarred of her 
radiance, 
Blood on her hands and greed in her 
heart ; — 

Blood of young patriots lavished for lib- 
erty, 

Greed of the conqueror, wile of the 
mart. 



This, for the splendor with which she faced 
Godward ! 
This, for the vision that heavened her 
eyes ! 
Bulk of the body for soul-growth im- 
perial, — 
O the mad barter of sin and surprise ! 

How can she sing of it, * Sweet land of 
Liberty,' 
She with her clarion used for its ban ? 
Hushed be the song till the silence re- 
teaches her 
Faith that makes faithful to God and to 
Man ! 



S4: AT THE PEACE CONGRESS: iSgg 

Have not the fathers pledged her to right- 
eousness ? 
Died not the sons to redeem from 
eclipse ? 
Vision shall star once again the sweet brows 
of her, 
Song be re-born on the beautiful lips ! 



AMERICA REDEMPTA: 1917-1918 

During the Great War for Liberty 

Was it for nothing, that Tryst of the Peace- 
makers ? 
Winters and summers have fled not a 
score, — 
All the earth rocks with the thmiders of 
battle, 
All the world aches in the anguish of war. 

Into the circle of horror she moveth. 

Radiant, beautiful : * Here is my all ! 
Take me repentant! The Rights of the 
People 
Henceforth forever my pledge and my 
call ! ' 

Hear her, O fathers, who gave her to right- 
eousness, 
Hear her, O sons, who redeemed from 
eclipse ! 
Vision is starring again the sweet brows of 
her. 
Song is reborn on the beautiful lips ! 



86 AMERICA REDEMPTA 

Not for a nothing ! Through home-break 
and heart-break 
Flooding as never the Dream sm:ges 
now, — 
'Peace on the earth,' the resolve of the 
nations : 
Souls of dead heroes are shrining the vow. 

Peace born of battle ! Through war to for- 
giveness ! 
Strange is the lessoning, ache of it long. 
Hearts taught communion by hands that 
are crimson, 
Crimsoned with blood of the brother gone 
wrong ? 

Yea, if it must be I The i3eoples lie gasping, 
Caught in the clutch of his frenzy to rule ; 

War stalks incarnate wherever he rages ; 
Liberty perishes, feast of a ghoul. 

God of the Must-Be, keep thou the heart, 
then! 

Used as thy angel of smiting, we ask. 
< Angel,' — not dragon : O Heart of America, 

Angel thyself for the awe of thy task ! 



AMERICA REDEMPTA 87 

Thou and thy comrades ! No dragon within 

us 

Serves the High God to slay dragons 

without : 

Only Saint Michael receives the commission, 

Only Saint George shall the victory shout. 

Nothing for self, but solely to liberate ! 
Battle, but only that battle may cease ! 
Victor, to make the earth safe for democ- 
racy. 
Widen man's brotherhood, stablish his 
peace ! 

Humbly, forgivingly, then shall the nations 

Seek them together a Sinai untrod, 
Hear the New Law in a Tryst of the 
Peace-makers, 
Frame a New World for the peoples of 
God! 

1918 



BEFORE THE EXPOSITION 

' /St. Louis is getting ready for its Exposition. But it is 
only April. All over the Exposition Grounds are most 
tempting suggestions of beauty to come: headless horses, 
human torsos awaiting the arms and legs that are in the 
shop, wings ready for bodies not yet arrived, and figures 
ready to be grouped.' — J. LI. J., in ' Unity,' April, 1901,. 

Headless horses, human torsos, 

Waiting arms and legs-to-be, 
Wings detached, and groups dissevered, — 

Chaos, welter, anarchy! 
Yet each shard a shred of beauty, 

Yet each curve a sweep of grace. 
Wings that hint the coming angel, 

Arms that prophesy the face. 

In a way and at a moment 

Known, predestined, all shall meet. 
Mated, wedded, in the glory 

Of the Master's thought complete ; 
Every limb achieve its gesture, 

Every torso find its whole, 
Every cluster act its drama 

In some rapture of the Soul. 



BEFORE THE EXPOSITION 89 

As I look, the vision widens, 

Vanishes the city fair, 
Round me History's vast horizons 

Strewn with wreckage aod despair; 
Here the limb and there the torso. 

Severed wings and hands and feet : 
Ruin ? Nay, but coming glory, 

Glory of the Man Complete ! 

Man the Gardener — Man the Builder — 

Man the Singer of the song — 
Man the Thinker — Man the Brother — 

Man the Righter of the wrong ! 
Onward, upward, through the ages 

Shaping Nature to its plan, 
Lo, the cosmic thought emerges, — 

Lo, the Son of God in Man ! 



1901 



1918 

Though the Christmas bells are muffled, 

And the carols will not sing, 
Still to faith the vision widens, 

And the torsos challenge fling : 
Slow the cosmic thought emerges, 

Long the agonies of birth, 
But the Master's purpose holdeth, — 

Peace, (BooDsMill, tbe Cbcist on ;i6artb! 



INDEX OF FIRST LINES 



Page 

Across a century's border-line 24 

Again the angel song we hear 33 

Age makes confession, if it urge 70 

A greenness of June, a warble of birds .... 60 

A summer in the silence of the hills 54 

Beneath these woodland arches dim' 34 

Born in a log-cabin, and he had a spelling-book 72 

Co-workers we with God! Were he to ask ... 49 

Forward through the ages 42 

From age to age how grandly rise 13 

From old to new, with broadening sweep ... 12 

God laid his rocks in courses 44 

Headless horses, human torsos 88 

Hear, hear, O ye Nations, and hearmg obey . . 8 
Here in the shade through all the changing 

years 65 

Here where our fathers built of old 16 

I know it all, —the lift, the light, the peace . . 61 

In every human heart 58 

In thee we meet on kindred ground 36 

Joy of morning in the skies 79 

Love-lighted to the end, she may have thought . 63 



92 INDEX OP FIRST LINES 

Pagb 

No prophet of the wilderness 38 

Not over great Jerusalem 31 

Now while the day in trailing splendor .... 27 

O Blest the souls that see and hear 26 

O day of light and gladness 29 

O Mother nigh-forgotten 74 

Still comes the Call to who will hear 46 

Still loom the Sinais, rugged, grand 5 

Sweet hill-top sessions wait you yet 71 

The outward temple stands complete .... 20 

The prairies to the mountains call .40 

' This day our daily bread ' 28 

Though the Christmas bells are muffled ... 90 
Through willing heart and helping hand ... 18 
Thy kingdom come, O Lord 7 

Uplift the song of praise 10 

Uplifted be the voice of praise 22 

Was it for nothing, that Tryst of the; Peace- 
makers? 85 

What gleams so bright on the mountain-top . . 77 

What's all the trouble 53 

What shall we be in that strange land .... 62 

When, among all life's miracles, I try .... 48 

When shadows gather on our way 15 

Why is she late at the Tryst of the Peace- 
makers? 81 

Winter-silent is the land 50 

Within these walls what voices break . . . . 37 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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